


shadows spreading where you stand

by LaughingStones, roachpatrol



Category: Motorcity
Genre: Body Horror, Dreams vs. Reality, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Mind Manipulation, Multi, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, Polyamory, Recovery, wound care
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-02-26 01:50:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 60,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13225650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughingStones/pseuds/LaughingStones, https://archiveofourown.org/users/roachpatrol/pseuds/roachpatrol
Summary: Dutch opens Mike’s comm line on the way back, says, “Look, no one thinks you’re useless, okay? I don’t know where you got that from, but it’s totally not true. I mean, we’re all worried about you right now, but we just— we want you to get better— look,nobodywould be in top form having nightmares all the time, okay? That’s nothin’ aboutyou.” God, why can’t he find the right words? He means everything he’s saying, but even to him it doesn’t sound persuasive.“Sure,” Mike says, low and defeated. “Nothing about me that I can’t keep it together for the simplest things anymore,” and he closes the line.





	1. Chapter 1

Mike’s been a little off, lately. Dutch noticed a couple of days ago, has been tracking it not-quite-consciously, the way he’s been smiling less, staying quiet when normally he’d speak up, just— acting different. It doesn’t seem that weird, at first; everyone has times they’re not doing so hot, times the stress of constant fighting and defending gets to them.

But usually when Mike goes through a period like that, he just throws himself into things all the more. He spars with Texas and cleans everything and pesters everyone to play games or watch movies with him. He gets even more social than he was before, and Mike’s a gregarious guy.

He doesn’t usually _withdraw_. The last week, though, he hasn’t been making the hangout suggestions he normally does, hasn’t invited Dutch to game with him or dropped by to check on his painting progress. Dutch is all for alone time, but he’s never known Mike to want it before.

It’s not an issue, necessarily, just a change. Still, he keeps an eye on it.

Mike often has little dark spots under his eyes. Dutch knows neither he nor Chuck sleep easily. But over the next few days, Dutch is pretty sure those spots are getting darker, bruised looking thumbprints that don’t fade.

Things get extra weird the time Dutch is working in the garage, Chuck ostensibly helping him but mostly snarking comfortably about various things, when Mike comes in and heads for Mutt. He gives Chuck and Dutch a small wave of greeting, almost shy, and hesitates a little before he says, “Hey guys.”

Dutch smiles at him. “Hey, man.”

“Hey, Mikey!” Chuck says. “Where you going?”

“Errands,” Mike says with a shrug.

There’s a pause as Dutch waits for the invitation that’s the usual second half of that statement, which doesn’t come. Chuck starts to look confused, as much as Dutch can tell under his bangs.

“You, uh, you don’t want company?” he says.

“Oh, that’s okay,” Mike says, “you don’t have to.” He gives them both a little smile. “Looks like you’re having fun, anyway, I wouldn’t want to… Um. S-see you guys later,” he finishes, and crosses quickly to Mutt, shoulders hunched.

Mouth slightly open, Chuck stares as he pulls out in Mutt, and Dutch frowns after the glow of the taillights.

“You can’t tell me that wasn’t weird,” Dutch says.

“I don’t even know what I did!” Chuck says, throwing his hands in the air. “He can’t be mad at me, I know what that looks like, but it’s like he doesn’t want to spend any more time around me than he has to!”

He’s trying to sound annoyed, but Dutch knows the guy better than that. “Hey,” he says, putting a hand on Chuck’s shoulder, “I’m pretty sure this isn’t about you at all, okay? He’s doin’ it to all of us. And even when he’s not keepin’ to himself, he’s been real quiet, you notice that?”

“Yeah,” Chuck sighs, and crosses his arms. “He was having nightmares last night,” he says quietly. “I heard him through the wall.”

“Well, there you go,” Dutch says. “Guy’s havin’ a hard time right now. Let him deal with it like he needs to. We just gotta be patient and be here if he needs us.”

“Right,” Chuck says, and sighs again. “Yeah.”

It’s not that Dutch knows what set this off, but at least after that he thinks he’s got the basic outline of what’s going on with Mike. The next mission makes him question that, though.

They’re in the middle of fighting off a swarm of bots, and Mike is calling out the plan of attack like he always does, only this time he keeps hesitating while giving orders, faltering instead of sounding his usual confident self.

“Julie, can you… um, draw them off to the left? And Dutch, you follow her, shoot them down from behind? We can split them up, t-take them down easier…”

“Can do, man,” Dutch says over the comms, as reassuringly as he can, because god, it sounds almost like Mike’s expecting them to _argue_ with him or something. The plan is fine, there’s nothing wrong with it, but there’s an uncertain tone in Mike’s voice Dutch has never heard before.

They take care of the bots without much trouble, get back to the hideout, and when Dutch gets out of Whiptail and looks around, everyone looks pretty cheerful— except for Mike, whose shoulders are hunched, hands in his pockets. Julie is grinning, following a bouncing Texas up to the diner, and Mike drifts after them. Chuck throws a look at Dutch, running a hand through his hair, and takes two quick steps to catch Mike’s sleeve.

“Mikey?”

Mike stops, turns, eyes flicking over to Dutch and back to Chuck. He flexes his shoulders back, then hunches them again. His smile is unsteady at the edges.

“What’s up, dude?” he says.

“Good mission, man,” Dutch says as he comes up to them, before Chuck can answer, because geez, it seems like Mike could use to hear it.

Mike’s eyes widen a little, he blinks and straightens slightly, shoulders easing from their tight hunch. His smile looks better as he shrugs. “You guys did most of the work.”

“You did as much as us, _and_ you were leading,” Dutch counters.

“Yeah, you did good, bro,” Chuck agrees. “Even if you did have to take us right over the edge of the road,” he adds on a quavering sigh.

And instead of grinning and throwing an arm over his shoulders, Mike _flinches_. “S-sorry,” he mutters. “There’s no exits along that stretch, we had to follow or lose them.”

Dutch knows he’s staring, but he can’t stop. All the tension is back in Mike’s posture and his eyes are down. Chuck’s jaw drops and he reaches for Mike, but stops awkwardly before touching him, wraps his arms around himself instead.

“Mikey?” he says, high and uncertain. “Is everything okay?”

Mike’s head snaps up and he smiles at them both reflexively, too bright, something like panic in his eyes. “Fine! Everything’s fine, dude, come on, we— I— I’m gonna grab something to eat,” he says, and wheels away, heading after Texas and Julie with long strides.

“Oh my god,” Chuck says thinly.

“Oh… kay,” Dutch says. “We gotta be chill about this, okay? Don’t, like, jump to conclusions or flip out or anything.”

“Too fucking late,” Chuck mutters, and Dutch sighs at him.

“Okay look, obviously there’s somethin’ goin’ on, yeah, and obviously he doesn’t wanna talk about it. We gotta respect that, right? We’ll just… keep an eye on things. It’s not like he’s putting himself in danger, he’s just—” Dutch stops to think of how to put it and Chuck cuts in.

“Acting like me.”

Dutch blinks at him.

“He’s acting like he expects things to go wrong at any minute.” Chuck chews on his lip. “The thing is, he wasn’t like this after he got away from Kane during the Genesis Cube, and that’s the worst thing that’s happened all year. Nothing new and really nasty has happened recently. Like, I mean, we had that tangle with the Terras two weeks back but—”

“But it was no big deal, compared to the time before,” Dutch finishes, nodding.

Chuck groans and runs a hand over his face. “I’ve never seen him like this before,” he says. “He’s always been cheerful and confident and, y’know, enthusiastic. High-energy. Recently he looks _tired_ all the time.”

“Oh my god, I’m an idiot,” Dutch says, slapping a hand to his forehead. “He’s probably comin’ down with somethin’! There’s gotta be viruses and stuff down here that we wouldn’t run into back in Deluxe, he’s probably fighting one of those off! That’s why he’s tired and kinda off and jumpy and stuff. So we don’t have to worry, just look out for him while he fights it off.”

He’s about to say that they can ask Jacob if he’s got any idea what it could be and what Mike should do to get better, when he remembers Jacob’s gone right now, off to a monster truck rally in another city with Hudson. They won’t be back for another couple weeks. Well, shoot.

“Oh,” Chuck says. “Yeah, that might make sense.” He blows out a sigh and starts up towards the diner again. “Man, I hope it’s nothing dangerous.”

“He’ll be fine,” Dutch says, just as Texas sticks his head over the edge of the diner platform and yells, “Hey, you nerds comin’ or what?”

Whatever it is, Mike doesn’t seem to be fighting it off. The next day, they’re all washing the cars, goofing around, spraying each other and squeezing soapy sponges down each other’s backs, and Mike looks more relaxed than Dutch has seen him in days. He’s laughing with the rest of them as Chuck and Julie tag team Texas to get him soaking wet, but the next time Dutch looks over, he’s sitting on the ground, leaning back against Mutt’s newly clean tire, eyes closed. His t-shirt has a broad wet patch across the chest where Julie got him, and it clings to his pecs as he breathes.

...He’s breathing really slowly. Dutch puts down his sponge and goes over, and Mike doesn’t stir as he comes near, his eyelashes don’t even flutter. Standing in front of him, Dutch raises his eyebrows in bemusement at the spectacle of Mike Chilton fast asleep during the day.

He’s frowning faintly in his sleep, and as Dutch watches he mumbles something too low to hear and his breathing speeds up. His fingers twitch, and a moment later he makes a noise like a very quiet moan, wavering and strange.

“The heck is Tiny doin’?” Texas says loudly, from across the garage, and Julie steps around Nine Lives to see.

She blinks. “Is he _asleep?_ ”

“He’s _what?_ ” Chuck turns and stares over Nine Lives’ roof. “He’s asleep. Oh my god. Dutch, how sick _is_ he?”

“If I look like a medtech to you, you need your eyes checked,” Dutch says over his shoulder.

Mike shifts restlessly and Dutch crouches down, puts a hand on his shoulder, because even if he needs the sleep, he doesn’t need whatever dream is putting that look on his face. It’s a miracle he could fall asleep in the first place with all the yelling of the water fight going on.

Mike wakes with a jerk, eyes opening wide on Dutch’s face as his whole body twitches sideways, away from Dutch’s hand. Blinking, Dutch lets go and sways backward, out of Mike’s space. Dang, that must have been one nasty dream.

“Hey, man, you all right?”

Mike swallows, takes a breath and smiles, not quite as panicky as the day before, but no more real. “Fine! I’m good.”

“Maybe you oughta go back to your room, get some real rest,” Dutch suggests. “Can’t be comfy sleeping against a tire like that. Maybe that’s why you were having bad dreams.”

Mike frowns a little, blinks a few times. “Sleeping? I was— that was— I was asleep?”

“Bro, you went down right in the middle of washing Mutt!” Chuck says, coming over. “If Texas yelling couldn’t keep you awake, I think maybe you should like, take a nap or something.”

Mike looks up at him, over at Julie, back at Dutch, smile faltering, and Dutch’s own smile fades in concern. The three of them are kind of gathered around him, but from the look on his face it’s more like they’ve got him surrounded.

“I’m fine,” Mike says in a low voice, and pushes up to his feet. “But yeah, okay.”

He turns and heads out of the garage with them staring after him.

“Dutch?” Chuck says, high and unsteady. “Tell me again how he’s just coming down with something?”

“He looked scared of us,” Julie says softly.

Dutch blows out a breath. “Not to mention, Chuck just told him to go take a _nap_ and he just… went.”

“So what is it?” Julie says. “You guys thought he was sick?”

“Well, he is lookin’ pretty run down lately, but…” Dutch trails off.

“But that can’t be it,” Chuck picks up, “or at least that’s not all. Being sick wouldn’t make him so… anxious.”

“I wish I had a clue, man,” Dutch sighs.

That seems to be all there is to say. If he is sick, he’ll get through it soon enough and there’s not much they can do. If he’s not sick… they have no idea what’s wrong and therefore no clue how to help. Unsettled, they finish washing the cars, including Mutt, since Mike didn’t finish rinsing her off before he fell asleep.

The next fight, two days later, is weirder and worse. Mike’s been alternating pacing restlessly around the base with sleeping in increasingly weird places, like he’s trying to hide from whatever nightmares keep bugging him, and he looks exhausted before they even get to their cars. Once they’re in them, he’s still quiet, pulled back from the rest of them.

“Mike, what do I _do?_ ” Dutch demands over the coms. “There’s like six hounds on my tail—”

“Uh— I don’t—get to Julie, she’ll know,” Mike says.

“ _Mike—_ ” he hears Chuck snap, before Mike’s line closes on Dutch.  

Dutch raises Julie. “Is Mike telling you anything?” he asks.

“No,” she says, sounding stressed. “And I can’t get to Texas, either, he says Mike said to just do what he wants, which is—”

“— _Not great_ ,” Dutch finishes. Stronghorn whips past them, all systems blazing, and takes out like half an ancient stripmall. Normally Mike would have something to say about structural damage, but he’s not reining Texas in at all, and the Hounds are galloping eagerly through the newly opened channels of wreckage.

“Okay, guys—” Mike’s line opens again, and he sounds normal again, confident, but then he says, “—Chuck has a plan. Listen up.”

Dutch frowns. Not that Chuck isn’t a smart guy, but…

“ _Mike_ ,” Chuck says again, exasperated, but Mike doesn’t say anything else. Chuck sighs, loud and staticky through everyone’s coms, and then goes on to outline a pretty decent feint-and-flank maneuver for the rest of them to pull off.

“Texas thinks that plan is dumb,” Texas says.

Mike doesn’t say anything. Dutch pulls into position, half an ear out, but— either they’ve taken it to private, or— no.

“Texas _said,”_ Texas says, “that _plan_ is _dumb_ , Tiny!”

“Chuck _knows_ what he’s doing,” Mike says. Voice tight. Kind of… bitter?

Dutch opens a private line to Chuck. “...Do you?” he asks.

“Ahaha, ha, no,” Chuck says. “But Mike’s— he’s out of it, man, we’re not gonna get anything better. Unless— do you?”

“Nope. Let’s go for it.”

“Texas just wants to know—” Texas starts.

“Texas can shut up,” Dutch says, back on the main line. “We’ll do Chuck’s thing. He’s got this.”

They do Chuck’s thing and it works perfectly, the Hounds following them into an ambush and then toppling right over like monster dominoes. Five minutes later it’s done and dusted, and they race, laughing, back to base.

“Dude!” Dutch yells, scrambling out of Whiptail. “Chuck, man, that was _awesome!”_

Chuck’s straightening up out of Mutt, running a hand through his bangs, and his smile is a giddy, incredulous thing. “I can’t believe that worked!” he exclaims. “Holy crap, I thought we were all gonna die.”

“You always think we’re all gonna die,” Dutch says, thumping him on the back. “But hey! Look at that, we’re all _great_.”

“Did you see those two hounds that smashed into each other?” Julie grins, trotting up. “ _That_ was great.”

“Yeah, you’re all welcome for how _great_ I saved everyone’s butt!” Texas puts in. “Whacha!”

Dutch looks back at Mutt in time to see Mike slink out of the driver’s side, head down, not looking at any of them.

“Mike!” he yells, and Mike _flinches_ all over. “Hey, man, get over here!”

Mike looks like he wants to run. What is _with_ him? Headache or something?

“It’s cool man,” Dutch says, trying for a quieter tone. “We’re all good, okay?” He claps Mike on the back when the guy gets in range and— man, yeah, wow, he looks wrecked. He looks like he shouldn’t even be standing up, let alone fighting.

“I’m really glad that worked out,” Mike says quietly.

“Chuck’s a genius, of course it did.” Dutch says. Chuck makes some kind of bashful inarticulate noise, and Julie laughs and pulls on his arm when he tries to cover his face. When Dutch looks back at Mike the guy’s leaning heavily against Mutt, staring dazedly at his feet. Julie and Chuck follow his gaze, then grimace at each other.

“Hey, cowboy, if you need some time off…” Julie says, hesitantly, and reaches out to pat Mike’s arm.  

“Yeah, dude, you should maybe take it easy,” Chuck says. “I mean— in the car— you weren’t… it didn’t seem like you were feeling a hundred percent, man,” but Mike’s shaking his head frantically.

“I’m fine!” he says hoarsely. “I mean I’m still— you guys all did great, I know you did, but I can— I can still _drive_ , okay? I’m still good, I can do it!”

Julie bites her lip and Dutch shifts uneasily. The desperation in Mike’s face is gut-wrenching, like he thinks they’re gonna bench him or something. Like anyone would _want_ to.

“Well… if you say so, man,” Dutch says. “Just… take care of yourself, okay? We’re getting kind of worried about you.”

“I’ll be _fine_ ,” Mike insists. “I’ll do better. I _promise_.”

Dutch frowns, because it’s not about _doing better_ , it’s not like Mike is— is slacking off or something, but Mike is looking from face to face, eyes wild and close to scared, and this doesn’t really seem like the time to be arguing with him.

“Okay, bro,” Chuck says, trying to be soothing, though it’s obvious how unnerved he is. “We believe you, it’s okay.”

Mike takes a breath and some of the tension eases in his shoulders as he flashes them all that bright fake smile. He’s getting better at it, but Dutch wishes he’d quit. It’s not fooling anybody, except maybe Texas, and it just looks wrong.

“Anyone up for a game?” Julie says after an awkward moment of silence, and they go up to play.

Mike falls asleep again in the middle of the game, and this time they let him sleep, because the guy obviously needs it, although it’s hard when he’s twitching and moaning softly the whole time. This time he wakes up himself after ten minutes or so, eyes flying open with a gasp.

“The heck were you dreamin’ about, Tiny?” Texas says, frowning at him. “Looked like it sucked! Texas wanted to wake you up, but they said no.”

Mike scrubs a hand through his hair, sitting up more from where he slumped down in the booth. “I don’t… dreaming?”

“Mikey, you’ve been having nightmares, like, _constantly_ ,” Chuck says, frowning at him. “Do you not remember what they’re about?”

Mike swallows, and there it is again, that hunch to his shoulders, the hunted look when he glances around at all of them, like he doesn’t trust them to have his back anymore. He shrugs.

“Not really, I guess. Pretty normal stuff, as far as I remember. T-talking with you guys, that kinda stuff.”

“Huh,” Chuck says. “Weird. I guess you forget the nightmare part.”

Mike looks down. “Yeah, guess so.”

Dutch frowns a little. That sounded like a lie, but he can’t figure out how it is one. How can dreaming about talking and hanging out be a nightmare? Maybe he’s just reading Mike wrong, what with his body language and the way he talks changing so much recently.

They go back to playing the game, and it’s fun, even if Mike is slightly out of it, reflexes slower than usual.

Over the next few days, Mike falls asleep more and more often in the middle of doing things: he won’t settle down and actually _rest_ , tearing around like he’s frantic to prove that he’s totally fine, like he can do anything, no matter what anyone has to say about it. He cleans all the storage rooms and rearranges them twice and weeds Jacob’s plants and even scrubs down every gunky old piece of equipment in the garage, and when he’s not doing that, he’s just pacing relentlessly around the base. Then someone finds him curled up on a tire or wedged into some weird corner or, once, really scarily, sprawled way too close to the edge of the diner landing.

Dutch and the others are torn between pushing him to get some rest in his dang _bed_ and laying the heck off, because every time they tell him to go sleep, knock it off, take care of himself, every time they show concern, he looks a little more crushed and hopeless, and then he just throws himself even harder at some dumb chore someone else could have done if it even needed doing in the first place.

“Hey, man,” Dutch tries to say once, “if you don’t slow down on all this scrubbing, you’re gonna wear through the walls and I’ll have to think of a new color scheme! Take it easy, would you?”

But Mike doesn’t laugh like he should, or remind Dutch how much he likes the excuse to plan some new murals. He doesn’t even smile. He _definitely_ doesn’t take it easy. He just looks around at the bathroom, quiet and miserable, then trudges off to go fuss over something else twice as hard.

It’s _awful_. They all know he hates being inactive, no matter what’s dragging on him, so what are they supposed to do?

They can’t tell him to stand down from missions, either, and missions are a different problem. He’s backed off making the plans and giving the orders almost completely, turning it all over to Chuck, and the strain on Chuck is starting to tell. It’s not that Chuck’s a bad strategist, or even that bad at thinking on his feet, but he’s not used to being the main ideas guy instead of backup. He also doesn’t have the confidence to call out orders the way Mike— well, used to— and Texas’s belligerence about taking direction from him doesn’t get any better.

It’s making every mission into a nightmare of arguing and struggling and winning by bare inches sometimes, and it’s starting to wear on everyone. They’re snappish and tired, Chuck is jumpy and pale, staring at walls almost like Mike, and Mike is of course more out of it than ever.

It comes to a head when Chuck confronts Mike after a mission. Everyone’s getting out of their cars, frustrated and ready to separate for a while, and Mutt’s doors don’t open. Dutch looks through the windshield and Chuck is waving his arms emphatically, talking low enough that Dutch can’t hear more than a murmur. Mike’s head is ducked, his face hidden behind his fringe. After a minute he shakes his head and opens the door.

“—leave yet, Mikey, I’m _serious!_ ” Chuck says, low and intense, and Mike just hunches his shoulders and gets out, slams the door.

Chuck scrambles out on the other side, lips set in a thin line, and stalks around to block Mike’s progress out of the garage. Dutch hesitates, reluctant to stick around for what looks like drama, but not wanting to leave a volatile situation untended. Mike seems so vulnerable lately, and none of them are used to pulling their punches with him.

Texas has already vanished into the diner, but Julie hesitates, a distance away, and crosses her arms to witness.

“You’re not listening to me,” Chuck says. “Bro, you are falling _apart_ , okay, something is _wrong_. We can’t just keep pretending everything’s okay! I mean, you look half-dead, you’re sleeping all the time, you’re not even leading us anymore!”

Arms wrapped around himself, Mike curls into himself a little more with each phrase. “’M sorry,” he says, so quietly Dutch almost can’t hear it. “I’m trying, I swear I am—”

“ _Mike_ , it’s not about _trying!_ ” Chuck says, raking a distressed hand through his hair. “Trying can’t keep you from falling asleep in the middle of the day! Hell, it can’t keep you from falling asleep at the _wheel_ , and what about when that happens, huh? Pretending you’re fine and that everything’s okay is gonna kill us!”

Mike is shaking his head, steady and desperate, but this time Chuck doesn’t back down.

“Yes it will!” he snaps. “In the middle of a fight or at three hundred miles an hour, either way we’re just as dead. We can’t keep going on like this!” He takes a deep breath and his throat moves as he swallows. “I’m not… I’m not riding with you while you’re like this. It’s not safe. I quit.”

Mike’s shoulders hitch once and he makes a tiny muffled noise, then nods, head down.

“That’s your call,” he says quietly.

It hurts to watch. Dutch presses his knuckles against his mouth and stays quiet, because what the hell is there to say? Chuck is absolutely right about all of it.

Chuck’s hands lift, hover in the air like he wants to reach out, try to comfort or reassure. He’s chewing on his lip, looking almost as miserable as Mike. This can’t be how he wanted things to go.

Taking another breath, he rubs a hand over his face and says, “Honestly, dude, I don’t think you should be driving at all. I know I can’t stop you,” he adds as Mike’s head snaps up, “but it’s not like it’s any safer for you alone than it would be for both of us—”

“I don’t care,” Mike says, low but clear. “ _That’s_ still _my_ call.”

Chuck waves his hands frantically. “Mike, I just want—”

He’s shaking his head, though, stepping back. “You want a lot of things. I know. It’s cool.”

“Mike!”

But Mike’s already turning away, heading back to Mutt.

“I’m gonna go out for awhile, look for some parts,” he growls. “Call me if anyone wants me for anything I can actually _do_.” He’s as close to angry as any of them have seen him in a long while.

Dutch exchanges a dismayed look with Chuck, then turns on his heel with an internal sigh, saying, “I’ll join you.”

Mike’s shoulders can’t get any higher around his ears when Dutch catches up, but he doesn’t exactly look thrilled. Dutch inhales and gets back into Whiptail anyway. In the state he’s in, Mike obviously needs backup, whether or not he wants it.

He follows Mike out to a remote junkyard, one closer to Terra land than they usually venture. Dutch leans against Whiptail and watches Mike prowl around restlessly, flipping through pieces of rusted metal, things bent and broken beyond fixing, like he’s barely seeing any of it.

Dutch is aware that this was probably an excuse to escape company for a while, get out and away from the rest of them, and he feels guilty about it, but he couldn’t justify letting Mike go off on his own like this. He does his best to give the guy some space, though, staring off into the distance instead of watching him, sticking by the cars while he wanders around. Mike goes out of sight behind a mountainous pile of junk and Dutch stays put. For ten or fifteen minutes things are peaceful, quiet.

Then Mike yells, startled and pained, and Dutch jerks upright.

“Mike?!” He starts forward at a trot, heading for the spot Mike disappeared.

“Terra vines,” Mike calls back, and Dutch comes around the corner to see him trying to fend off a mass of waving green tendrils with his staff. His jacket rides up as he swipes at the vines and Dutch catches a glimpse of red against his white t-shirt.

“Holy crap!” Dutch says, and starts forward instinctively.

“They’ve got thorns, s-stay— maybe stay back,” Mike says, and grunts as a vine wraps around his arm and yanks. A second later his staff cuts through it and he’s free again, but he’s not moving as fast as he would have been a week or two ago, and there are a lot of vines.

“Get the heck outta there, man!” Dutch tells him, jittering on the sidelines. He wants to dive in and help, but his omnitool doesn’t have nearly the range it’d need to keep him away from those thorns, and since the vines haven’t managed to trap Mike yet, it’s better if they both just pull back, maybe come back later with Jacob’s special spray.

“No!” Mike says, cutting through another four vines at the expense of a rip in his pants leg that Dutch suspects has blood under it. “I can do this!” He hisses as another vine lashes around his chest, cuts the plant off in a spray of sap. “I’m not running away. I’m _not_ —” another sliced vine, “— _useless!_ ”

Dutch stares open-mouthed for a moment, swears under his breath and runs for Whiptail. Starting her up, he slams on the gas, careens through the junkyard and stops a couple yards behind Mike, yelling out the window, “Get out the way _now!_ ”

Mike darts a glance over his shoulder, hesitates, and dives to the side as Dutch sets off his sonic blasters. The vines sway backwards and start thrashing around like they know they’re being attacked and are trying to find their opponent. Dutch waves at Mike to back up and slowly, reluctantly, he does.

After a few minutes the vines go limp, flopping over on the ground, and the leaves Dutch can see look slightly withered and curled. Cautiously, he turns the sonics off and the vines don’t twitch. Someone will have to come back in a few days, check that did the trick, maybe spray the area just to be safe. For the moment it looks okay, though.

Dutch pulls around and finds Mike slumped against Mutt, staring at the ground. The red spots across his chest show vividly under his open jacket. It’s hard to tell against the rest of his dark clothes, but Dutch is pretty sure he’s bleeding from a few places besides that.

“Come on,” Dutch says tiredly out the window. “Let’s head back to base and get you fixed up, all right?”

Mike doesn’t even answer, just nods without looking at him and gets into Mutt.

Dutch opens Mike’s comm line on the way back, says, “Look, no one thinks you’re useless, okay? I don’t know where you got that from, but it’s totally not true. I mean, we’re all worried about you right now, but we just— we want you to get better— look, _nobody_ would be in top form having nightmares all the time, okay? That’s nothin’ about _you_.” God, why can’t he find the right words? He means everything he’s saying, but even to him it doesn’t sound persuasive.

“Sure,” Mike says, low and defeated. “Nothing about me that I can’t keep it together for the simplest things anymore,” and he closes the line.

Dutch stares at the place the comm screen was and swears, using a few words his mama would be appalled he even knows. Frustration and anxiety knot up in his chest. Mike won’t even listen to him, and the guy’s state of mind might be worse than Dutch was afraid of. God, what a mess.

They get back to the hideout. Dutch chivvies Mike up to a bathroom, where it’ll be easier to clean him up, and calls Chuck in to do the first aid, which he’s better at.

With his chest and legs bare, in just his shorts, it’s a lot more obvious exactly how clawed up Mike got. He’s not _covered_ in blood, exactly, but those lashing vines dug thorns in just about everywhere they touched, and the oozing wounds are stark red against his olive skin.

“Aw, _geez_ , Mikey,” Chuck says, looking him over, and starts going at him with the gauze and disinfectant, cleaning out the scratches and gouges. There’s just enough room for Dutch to stand on Mike’s other side and help, watching what Chuck is doing and keeping his touch as light as he can.

When they’re done with his arms and legs, Chuck says, “Okay, turn so I can get your back.”

Head down and silent, Mike turns towards Dutch, who reaches out to dab carefully at the rake marks across his chest when Chuck says, “What the— lean forward.”

He pushes against Mike’s back and Mike obediently folds down, baring a back covered with scratches— and something small and green, right across his spine.

“What the hell is that,” Chuck says as Dutch stares at it. It looks kind of like a flattened burr, a bristling oval digging into Mike’s skin, although oddly not drawing blood. Chuck wraps a little piece of gauze over it and tries to pull it away, swears softly in an unnerved tone when it doesn’t move.

In the end he has to use tweezers to get it off, and Mike jerks all over when it comes loose, gasping.

When Chuck holds it up they see why it stuck so firmly. Little trails of blood are trickling down Mike’s back, and thin wet tendrils are waving from the red underside of the burr pinched firmly in the tweezers. The thing was _rooted_ in him.

“Holy shit,” Chuck says, high and cracking, and then shrieks and drops the tweezers as the tendril that just brushed his finger clings. “Ow!” he yelps, shaking his hand frantically, but the burr sticks, more tendrils grasping and trying to burrow into the back of his hand.

Mike, who’s been staring in just as much horror and dismay as the other two, grabs his wrist, snatches the burr, ignoring the rootlets grabbing for him, slaps it onto the side of the sink, and picks up his discarded boot to grind the thing into pulp.

“Holy crap, holy crap, _holy crap_ ,” Chuck is moaning. “Mikey! Holy crap!”

“It’s okay,” Mike says, and flashes them a smile, startlingly bright and confident. “It’s cool, dude. I _know_ this one’s a nightmare.”

Dutch swallows hard. “Dude, I’m pretty sure it’s real.”

“Nah.” Mike drops his boot and examines the green smear in the sink.

“...Is this like a lot of your nightmares?” Chuck asks.

“What? Yeah, I guess, some of them,” Mike says. Even though he’s still kind of bleeding a lot and there was a _crazy parasite monster plant_ that was _attached to his spine_ he seems almost chipper now. “You’re in most of them, though, you know? I always kind of wonder why you guys don’t remember them better.”

“Mike,” Dutch says carefully. “This is…” _crazy? Scary? Super messed up for real?_ “...A lot.”

Mike straightens up, blinking at them both. “No,” he says mildly. “You’re not cutting me up or anything and there’s just this one little monster. It’s pretty good so far. I mean, unless you’re gonna start?”

“No!” Dutch and Chuck say at the same time, and Mike flinches back at the volume.

“Haha! Cool, okay. Okay…” Mike looks around, frowning, and seems to sort of run out of steam all at once, and look more tired than ever. “...I don’t feel so good,” he says, and sags slowly to his knees. “It was only the one monster though…”

When Chuck goes down beside Mike, he flinches away from Chuck’s hands, but he’s already falling asleep again. This fast, it looks a lot more like passing out.

“Oh my god,” Chuck says thinly, looking up at Dutch.

Dutch nods in full agreement. The calm way Mike dismissed the horror of the burr thing, the weird assumptions about how they should remember his dreams, the stray comment about them _cutting him up_ — yeah. Oh my god.

“Lean him up against the wall, maybe?” he suggests. “We gotta finish cleaning him up.”

Chewing on his lip, Chuck pulls Mike forward against him first so Dutch can get at his back, flush out the holes that thing put in him and make sure there’s no root bits or anything left. When those and the wounds on the rest of his back are clean and disinfected and bandaged, they prop him carefully against the wall and start on the cuts on his chest. Chuck is disturbed and preoccupied enough that he doesn’t even blush once, and Dutch is too distracted to think about teasing him.

“Did he get that thing today?” Chuck says. “The thorn plant you guys fought, did it—”

“No, I don’t think it had burrs,” Dutch says. “I mean, not like I got a close look, but— we _just_ ran into the thing, though. Those little roots were… deep.”

“God,” Chuck says convulsively, and shudders. “So where— when did he— oh. Oh no. Dutch.” He swallows, swipes the back of one blood-streaked hand across his forehead to shove his bangs aside, blue eyes huge on Dutch’s. “No. Nooo, no no no no.”

Dutch nods reluctantly. “I think so,” he sighs. “A couple weeks back, that run-in we had with the Terras.”

“ _Weeks_ ,” Chuck says numbly. “So— you think the nightmares—?”

Dutch looks down at Mike, whose face is still, more peaceful in sleep than they’ve seen in… a long time. “Yeah. And maybe the other stuff, too.”

“So this entire time— and we _knew_ something was wrong with him! God, I can’t _believe_ —”

“What, we were supposed to guess it was a parasitic Terra thing causin’ all the problems? Maybe corner Mike and rip off his clothes just to check he didn’t have anything weird goin’ on? Not that I’m saying we wouldn’t all enjoy that—”

Chuck goes red and shoves Dutch, who manages to catch himself instead of toppling over on the bathroom floor. Geez, he keeps forgetting about that cyborg strength because Chuck hardly ever uses it.

“Man, it’s luck that we found out at all,” he points out. “Yeah, it sucks that it took this long, but beating ourselves up about it isn’t gonna help Mike.”

Chuck blows out a breath and tapes some gauze carefully in place over a nasty gouge just under Mike’s pecs, the last cut left. Then he sits back.

“We don’t know exactly what this thing was doing to him. If we can figure that out, we’ll know if he’s just gonna go back to normal or if there’s been… if the effects will take time to wear off. If he’ll need help, and, like, what we can do.”

“Well, we know what it looked like, how he was actin’,” Dutch says thoughtfully. “If we put our heads together, we can probably get some pretty good guesses down about what was happenin’, and then ask him to confirm when he wakes up. Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Chuck says, sounding a little brighter.

Mike moans faintly and they both look down at him as he twitches in his sleep, that familiar crease between his brows. Dutch refuses to think about what he might be dreaming.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Chuck says under his breath.

Dutch sighs. “Let’s get him into bed, if we can without waking him. Then we can talk this over.”


	2. Chapter 2

Mike wakes up in his bed and thinks tiredly, _Crap_. He doesn’t remember going to sleep in his bed in days, which means it’s possible everything since then was just a dream. Dang, this doesn’t get any less confusing, he can’t seem to get used to it.

The blankets are warm against his skin, he’s only wearing his shorts. Little aches and stinging pains throb all over him, but the weird thing is that it feels _real_. He’s almost sure he’s actually awake.

He hasn’t been this sure he wasn’t dreaming in… a while, he’s not sure how long. When he goes to check his dreams for comparison, not only do the bits he remembers from the past night not feel real like this, but he can barely remember what he was dreaming at all. That’s... really different.

Shoving the covers back, he sits up, and realizes that the pulling sensations all over are because he’s covered in bandages and patches of gauze. Oh wow, that thing about the thorn vines was real, then. Or at least from a dream that’s consistent with this one— no. No, he’s not dreaming. This is real, so that was real too.

It’s a huge relief to know something for sure— until the next piece comes clear to him.

... _Dang_. Mike drops his face into his hands. If the thorn vines were real, that means Chuck and Dutch really did fix him up like this, get him all cleaned and bandaged and— _crap_. All that after Chuck pretty much said straight out he didn’t want to be around Mike anymore. He’s going to take Mike’s head off for this. And Mike will deserve it, putting him to all that trouble.

Taking a deep breath, he swings his legs off the bed and stands up, startled to find that there’s no moment of dizziness, he doesn’t have to use willpower to stay upright because his legs actually have some strength in them. He’s still tired, but it’s not the dragging exhaustion it has been.

Jeez, so far it’s a really good day. Maybe it’ll stay good, if his friends aren’t so sick of him that they’re ready to throw him out today.

When he gets down to the diner, Chuck is perched on a stool typing frantically at his screens. Mike hesitates, kind of wanting to say hi even though it’s stupid to interrupt him, especially when he’s already pissed at Mike.

Chuck looks up and sees him, though, and the screens vanish as he jumps up and hurries over. “Mikey! Hey, dude, how do you feel?”

...He doesn’t sound angry at all, just concerned. Mike blinks a few times and manages a cautious smile, which gets one in return.

“I, uh, pretty good, I guess? I mean, the cuts hurt some, but it’s no big deal— uh, hey.” He grimaces apologetically, shoves a hand through his hair. “I didn’t thank you guys for, y’know, getting me cleaned up and stuff. And, jeez, putting me in bed, I guess, I— thanks. Um. You didn’t have to. But I really appreciate it.”

Chuck’s mouth hangs open a minute before he says, “I didn’t— I _know_ I didn’t have to, but, what, was I not supposed to help you out when you needed it? Whatever, dude, like I was gonna do that. Hey, grab something to eat, I gotta ask you some questions.”

He strides back to his stool, starts typing again, and Mike bites his lip and goes to root through the fridge. One of the casseroles Jacob left for them in the freezer mysteriously tastes okay, so Mike cuts off a chunk and heats it up, trying not to think about what kind of questions Chuck probably has for him.

 _What’s wrong with you, why can’t you keep it together anymore, is there any point to having you on the team, who should we replace you with…_ Yeah, he’s pretty sure he can guess what this is going to be about.

He almost wishes someone else was around so Chuck would go easier on him. ...Except that wouldn’t work, would it. Dutch and Julie were standing there watching the last time Chuck ripped into him, and they didn’t say anything.

His stomach is knotting up in a lump, but he knows he needs to eat, so he carries the plate out and takes a stool one away from Chuck’s so as not to crowd him. Chuck looks over at him, opens his mouth and closes it again.

“Um,” he says, and clears his throat. “So, we think this thing hitched a ride when we had that fight with the Terras like two weeks ago, which is kind of a long time for it to have gone unnoticed, but it was right in that spot between your shoulder blades where it’s tricky to reach, so—"

“Uh, dude?” Mike says. He’s reluctant to interrupt, especially when Chuck’s not mad at him yet, but— “Am I supposed to know what you’re talking about?”

Chuck closes his mouth, opens it again, makes a squeaky noise and closes it. He blows out a breath, typing a note on whatever file he’s working in.

“Okay,” he says in a steady, deliberate tone. “Do you not remember that gross Terra parasite thing we pulled off you, or are you just still assuming it was a nightmare?”

Mike stares at him, heart speeding up as he reevaluates, again, what’s real and what’s not. That felt so much like a dream, he just assumed, but Chuck is talking like it’s real. Is Mike sure _this_ is real? He was sure when he woke up because compared to his drifting, fragmented dreams, waking was sharp and vivid, but so have all his dreams been recently. Maybe he just dreamed that he woke up.

He takes a breath and says as calmly as he can, “I was assuming that was a dream, yeah.”

Carefully, he mentally lists the evidence that this is real:

-It feels real.  
-It’s consistent with the vine fight yesterday and getting fixed up afterwards, and at least half the dreams don’t have that level of continuity.  
-He’s thinking pretty clearly right now, which he thinks he usually can’t do in the dreams.

On the other side, the evidence that this is a dream:

-That tiny plant monster being on Mike’s back, unnoticed, until someone finally ripped it off and Mike crushed it, is pretty par for the course for his dreams these days.  
-One of the most lasting pieces of continuity in his life recently has been that his friends are pretty much sick and tired of him and his crap, and Chuck in particular is done with him. Chuck is not acting done at all right now, which suggests this is a particularly nice dream.

It’d be helpful if he could just ask Chuck, but if this _is_ real, that’s not the kind of question he’s likely to get away with right now, when his teammates already think he’s a total screw-up and possibly losing it. Not that he’s saying they’re wrong, but he doesn’t want to leave the team. He’ll stay as long as they’ll let him.

“Okay,” Chuck says, relaxing some. “Okay, that’s fine, that’s weird but fine, memory problems would— would just kind of suck, in addition to everything else.” He makes another note as Mike swallows, picking at his food. _Everything else that REALLY sucks about you these days_ , Chuck doesn’t have to say out loud.

“Okay,” Chuck repeats, looking back up at him. “That definitely happened. Um, I don’t remember any of your dreams, in case you were wondering, but I do remember that. And Dutch does too, you can talk to him if you want. So. Uh. Two weeks, right. So we’ve been trying to figure out what it was doing, and we came up with a list of possibilities, but obviously we don’t know what it was like from the inside, so it seemed like a good idea to run it by you and see if you had any additions.”

Mike swallows a bite of casserole, trying to follow this at all. He doesn’t want to sound like more of an idiot than he has to, doesn’t want to piss Chuck off, but… what?

“What it was… doing? I mean, it was just on me, wasn’t it? I— I think I’d have noticed if it was trying to kill me or something, and it’s not like I’ve been hallucinating like I was on that fear gas stuff.” Sort of half-dreaming while you’re exhausted but technically awake doesn’t really count, he thinks. 

Chuck grimaces and Mike watches him warily from the corner of his eye, waiting for the irritated huff, the snap, the yelling.

“Yeah,” Chuck says instead, “just having nightmares so vivid you couldn’t tell if you were awake or not last night. And looking more and more exhausted and dragged out every day, and falling asleep in weird places, and refusing to take care of yourself, and—”

Mike hunches his shoulders at the litany of ways he’s been messing up, letting everyone down, failing to meet expectations. It’s not that he’s surprised to have it thrown in his face, he just doesn’t understand what it has to do with—

“Wait,” he says, head snapping up. “Are you saying that thing was…?”

“Yes!” Chuck says, nodding vigorously. “It’s gotta be, all that stuff started _right after_ we ran into the Terras. The parasite thing was obviously causing it all. It's not fear toxin, but it's something like it. Just... subtler.”

Mike forgets to breathe for a moment, staring at him, heart slamming against his ribs. If that’s true, if Mike wasn’t just falling apart for no reason this whole time, that means he’ll be able to get it back together now that it’s gone. And if he can pull it together, if he can be the way he’s supposed to be, if he can stop being this stupid wreck, this _failure_ , maybe his team will start to like him again. Maybe they’ll be willing to keep him around for longer than the next week or so.

“Oh,” he says, and his voice comes out kind of faint. “Huh.”

Chuck smiles at him, lifts a hand and stops, biting his lip, smile fading. “Um, can I move over one, bro? Or, like, hug you or something? It— it’s fine if you need your space, I get it, I just—”

“No,” Mike blurts out, eyes wide, “no, I don’t— please, you can, um, whatever you want, I thought _you_ wanted space—" He’s holding out a hand, inviting Chuck closer, and instead of moving to the nearer stool Chuck just stands, takes two steps and wraps his arms around Mike. Mike swallows hard and hugs him back, careful not to cling as tightly as he wants.

“God, I was worried about you,” Chuck mutters against the side of his head. “We couldn’t figure it out, you just looked so exhausted and miserable and I didn’t know how to fix it. But you’re okay now, you’re gonna be okay.”

Mike squeezes his eyes shut and nods. If this is a dream, it’s the best one he remembers having in a long time.

Chuck squeezes him one last time and lets go, then makes a production of getting on the stool next to Mike’s and his screen back up so he doesn’t have to look at Mike for a moment. If Mike wasn’t really clear that Chuck _can’t_ be mad at him right now, he’d be worried. Since he _is_ clear, he just smiles quietly at his plate. Chuck is really great sometimes. Most of the time, even.

Wow, Mike’s actually pretty hungry now. He starts stuffing his face more purposefully as Chuck clears his throat, scrolling down on his screen.

“Okay, so, um, just nod if you noticed the symptom I mention, and if you’d describe it differently or if I get something wrong, let me know. Like I said, we’re just guessing about a lot of this, you’re the only one who knows.”

Mike nods comprehension, chewing.

“Okay, so like, exhaustion. Was that because you weren’t getting good sleep, or because the plant was draining you somehow, could you tell?”

Wow, that’s really hard to separate. Mike thinks about it a bit, squinting, and finally says, “I think it _must’ve_ been making me tireder, I mean… I’ve had insomnia before, for days in a row, and it never felt like that before.”

Chuck nods, noting it down. “Next, the obvious, nightmares. Dreams so vivid you sometimes didn’t notice you’d been dreaming, is that right?”

Mike nods.

“I mean, just for completeness’ sake, what are your dreams like normally? Or, uh, what were they like before the last few weeks?”

Mike frowns to himself, trying to think back that far. “I didn’t remember them much at all. And they never seemed real, I could always tell when I woke up if something had really happened or not.”

Chuck nods, typing away. “And the nightmares were really persistent, it seemed like you were pretty much never just dreaming, it was always something nasty.”

Swallowing another bite, Mike hesitates. “Mostly,” he says slowly. He smiles a little, thinking of the water fight in the garage. “Some of them were good dreams. Just, yeah, lots more bad ones.”

“What, really?” Chuck taps his fingers against the bar in a quick run. “That’s interesting. Every time I saw you sleeping, you were obviously not having a good time. Were the good dreams more normal than the others, or were they still vivid and real-seeming?”

“Oh, they were pretty real, dude,” Mike says, thinking of the way Texas’s white tank had gone translucent as Chuck and Julie soaked him mercilessly, the way Chuck had grinned, breathless and amused. It didn’t end so happily, but it’d been nice while it lasted.

“Uh- _huh_ ,” Chuck says. “Well, I was going to ask you what it was about, but now—”

“No!” Mike says, protesting the smirk at the corner of Chuck’s mouth. “Hey, no! Nothing like that! It was just— really cute, and fun, was all. I swear, stoppit! No, it was, we were washing the cars, and like, you and Julie were—"

The smile has fallen off Chuck’s face. “Ganging up on Texas?” he says.

Mike stares at him. He’s still not in top form and it takes a second to go from _How does he know_ to _...Oh._

“That was… real?”

Chuck nods, licking his lips. “Yeah, Mikey. That was last week, we actually did that. You fell asleep in the middle of it, that was the first time we saw you sleeping randomly like that.” He pauses. “Is that why you thought it was a dream, because you did dream a little then? Although it didn’t seem like it was a good dream…”

Mike grimaces. “You got that right.” He stuffs another bite in his mouth while he thinks about it. “I guess,” he says after a minute, “it just had such a different— mood? From everything else that was going on, like everyone was relaxed and happy and playing around and no one was angry or yelling until the card game later…”

Chuck looks kind of frozen, mouth open, hands still. Mike tries to think of a way to put it that sounds a little less pathetic.

“It, it just stuck out, compared to the rest of what was going on around it. It didn’t seem to fit, so I just, I thought… I guessed wrong,” he says, hunching, and bites his tongue on the _sorry_ that wants to follow, because he’s pretty sure it’s not going to help anything.

“Okay,” Chuck says, faint and high, and reaches out to put a hand on Mike’s shoulder. “Don’t— stop looking like that, bro, you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not your fault that plant was messing with your head, okay?”

Mike slides him a sideways look. He sounds completely sincere, not even a little scornful or dismissive, which is confusing, but really nice. And— it’s different, isn’t it, if it really was that plant the whole time? Maybe it does mean Mike isn’t such a pathetic screw-up, this wasn’t entirely his fault. The thought weighs down his stomach with guilt in immediate reaction, like he’s trying to evade responsibility, but… Chuck is a smart guy, and it’s not like he’s been cutting Mike a lot of slack recently. Maybe if he says it’s not Mike’s fault, it’s true.

Chuck lets out a breath. “Okay. God, this sucks. Um, how much guessing have you been doing, dude? I mean, on a daily basis, like, would you mostly be sure about what happened that day, or...”

Mike looks down at his nearly empty plate. “I’m pretty sure I’m awake right now,” he says quietly. It feels like a terrible idea to admit it out loud, like something Chuck could all too easily use as ammo, proving Mike’s too messed up to be on the team anymore, except— Chuck is being so nice right now. It seems like maybe he’s decided to give Mike a second chance.

Chuck’s hand tightens on Mike’s shoulder. “Oh my god, Mikey,” he says in dismay. “It’s been that bad? _Damn_.” He lets go to rub both hands over his face, groaning. “That must be so _confusing_. Okay, so— everything.” He spreads his hands, looking at Mike for confirmation. “You’ve been guessing about everything, trying to tell if it’s real or not.”

Mike nods cautiously and Chuck sucks in a long breath and nods back, making another note on his screen. Then he pauses, chewing on his lip, and goes into a spate of typing, so Mike finishes off the last of his breakfast and goes to take care of the plate.

When he gets back, Chuck is still typing, but less frantically. “So,” he says as Mike sits down, “if you had a hard time telling what was real and what was a dream, if both felt similarly real and you were making judgments based on— what? Which fit together with the rest of what you remembered?” He looks over at Mike, actually waiting for an answer.

Mike nods, frowning as he tries to put it into words. “Partly. Partly what seemed— realistic, reasonable. Like, I mean, the monsters invading the hideout and rampaging through the city, all those dreams hung together, they were consistent with each other, but uh, I mean, all I had to do was look around the place when I woke up and I could see it hadn’t happened.” He gives Chuck a small grin, shrugs. “And the ones where I died or—” you guys stabbed me, no, he’s keeping that bit to himself, “—y’know, that kind of thing, that was pretty obvious.”

No need to mention the ones where everyone was dead but him, and he was trying to figure out if killing himself would be enough of a sacrifice to bring them all back, or the ones where he was the only one dead and everyone was relieved. The second one probably just sounds dumb, and Chuck might find the first one disturbing.

Chuck nods, biting his lip. “Good for you,” he says, typing, and Mike blinks. “Keeping track like that. Okay. So, the thing is, you did the best you could with what you had, but I’m guessing there are some dreams you haven’t mentioned, that you had a harder time dismissing. Some that seemed closer to normal life, hanging out with us and stuff.”

Mike nods, and doesn’t say the only way he knew the ones where all the Burners lit into him at once were dreams was because he didn’t hurt enough when he woke up. He ached enough from sleeping rough and working too hard while being clumsy and out of it, lately, to be particularly sure if he'd gotten on any one Burner's bad side, from day to day. He never knew where he picked up his bruises anymore, though he could hope they were mostly from bumping into things, instead of people. 

Chuck's still typing. “...Hmm, and, if you made the reasonable mistake of assuming some of those were real, and then you were basing your guesses about everything else on a picture that included those— that could get skewed pretty fast. Man. That’d explain the anxiety all by itself.”

Mike considers pointing out that also, having your friends finally come clean about exactly how many ways you've been consistently failing them, falling down on the job, and being a jerk, doesn't really put you in a good mindset, even if it was some dumb Terra plant that drove them to the snapping point. He decides against it because Chuck might take it as a criticism, and Mike doesn't mean it that way, he doesn't think. Better to keep his mouth shut.

Chuck makes another note, bites his lip again and looks over at Mike. “Plus, that means, uh, you might not have the clearest idea of what actually happened the past few weeks.”

Again, it seems dangerous to agree, but... if Mike can’t trust Chuck when he’s going out of his way to be helpful and kind, he may as well lie down and die right now. He nods.

“So the question is, how do we fix it.” Chuck taps his fingers on the bar again, fast and rhythmic. “I guess we could go over events as far as I can remember them, maybe get Dutch or Julie to help, and compare that to what you’d sort of deduced.”

Somewhat daunted, Mike considers this. “That kinda seems like a lot of work, man. I don’t want to put you guys through that much trouble. Can’t we just, like, keep in mind I might… remember things wrong, and go on from here?”

Chuck nibbles on his lip in a dubious kind of way, hesitating.

“Mike!” says a voice from behind them, and Mike jumps and looks around fast. Dutch is striding towards him, bright-eyed and grinning.

“You’re up! How you feel?”

Mike flicks an uncertain look at Chuck, who’s watching him, still biting his lip, and back at Dutch, who seems honestly delighted to see him. Not like Mike is getting in his way, and not like he’s just being polite.

“Pretty good,” Mike says cautiously, trying a smile.

“Awesome!” Dutch puts a hand on his shoulder, surprisingly light, like Mike might be breakable. “You checked out those cuts yet today? Some of those bandages probably need changin’.”

Mike blinks. “Oh, uh, no. I haven’t.” He’s braced for the sigh, the eyeroll, the complaints about how if he’s not even responsible enough to do the simplest things for himself, how are they supposed to trust him to lead them, but Dutch just nods. Not even like Mike is living down to his low expectations, but like it’s perfectly understandable.

“Not like you could do the ones on your back anyway,” he says, and pats Mike’s shoulder gently. “We can help you out with that. If, uh, if that’s okay.”

Mike stares at him a second before nodding a little too fast. This is really weird. Good! But weird. Maybe Dutch has decided to give him a second chance too?

“Cool,” Dutch says with a smile. He turns to Chuck without taking his hand off Mike’s shoulder, which feels... really nice, jeez, all warm and relaxed and close and… caring, maybe, is the word Mike is looking for. Whatever it is, he has to blink a few times to get his eyes to stop burning. Which is probably dumb, but hey, nobody’s noticed, he’s okay.

“How far’d you get through the symptom list?” Dutch asks Chuck.

“Oh, haha, um, we got a little distracted I guess,” Chuck says, tugging at his bangs. “Turns out the dreams were _so realistic_ , Mike had a hard time figuring out what was a dream and what really happened. So I was trying to figure out how to catch him up on, like, the last two or three weeks in reality.”

“Hey,” Dutch says softly, patting Mike again. “Man, don’t go all hunched up, he wasn’t sayin’—”

“Mikey, no!” Chuck says, sounding dismayed. “You didn’t do anything wrong, I didn’t mean to make it sound like—”

“I-I know,” Mike says, straightening again with an effort and trying to smile. Man, he’s tired, suddenly. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize, man,” Dutch says. “Probably gonna take you a while to get out from under all the stuff that parasite was doin’ to your head. Don’t— don’t worry about it too much, okay? It’s not like we’re gonna blame you for any of it. Just take it easy.”

Mike swallows and nods, throat tightening at the concern and kindness in Dutch’s voice. He and Chuck are both being so patient.

“All right,” Dutch says, “I’m not really sure how important the catch-up is, I mean it sucks that he might be missin’ stuff, but it’s not like anything really important and unusual happened. Anyway, we can figure that out later. How ‘bout right now,” he turns back to Mike, “we get you back in the bathroom and check up on those cuts, and maybe Chuck can finish goin’ through the list of questions with you. Sound okay?”

Mike nods again and Dutch looks at Chuck, who sighs and shrugs, turning up one hand.

“I think he deserves to know what stuff actually happened, even if it’s not important, but I guess it’s not our first priority,” he says. “All right,” he tells Mike, “let’s check that we cleaned everything as well as we should have and those stupid thorns didn’t secretly poison you even _more_.”

Dutch sighs. “There’s that optimism we were waitin’ for.”

Mike is obviously even farther off his game than he’d realized, because it takes until they get into the bathroom to realize that the cuts are kind of _all over_ him and he’s gonna have to take off his clothes. He did yesterday, too, of course, but it was different when Dutch and Chuck were mad and barely tolerating being in the same room as him. Today they’re being friendly and kind and it’s— well, Mike just hopes he doesn’t… have a weird reaction, to all the touching and stuff. Maybe it’s a good thing he’s so tired out right now.

He gets his clothes off and tries not to look anyone in the face. Dutch and Chuck start right in getting bandages off and poking things, Dutch working on Mike’s back, Chuck on his legs. Mike protests that he can do the ones in front himself, Chuck doesn’t have to do this, and tries to remember at the same time if he managed to say that yesterday or not, but it’s too blurry to be sure.

Chuck just snorts at him, slightly flushed and keeping his eyes on what he’s doing. “Right, because you’re so good at taking care of yourself, Mikey.”

He doesn’t even say it with a meaningful twist to his mouth, but Chuck’s gotten pretty casual about even the harshest criticism lately. _Irresponsible, careless, making your friends do all the work for you, thoughtless jerk_ —

“Hey,” Dutch says, touching his shoulder. “You okay?”

“’M not trying to make work for you guys, I swear,” Mike mutters, head down, face turned aside so he doesn’t have to look at Chuck.

“Dude, we know!” Chuck says, sounding startled. “I didn’t mean— oh jeez, bro, don’t be all— I just meant you’re never as careful with this stuff when you’re doing it on yourself instead of someone else!”

 _Can’t even look after yourself, not like the rest of us don’t have better things to do than babysit_ — Mike closes his eyes and nods, tries to just keep breathing.

“Oh my god,” Chuck says, and Mike can’t tell if his tone is more frustrated or unhappy.

“Did we get this down in the list?” Dutch asks.

“Um. Sorta,” Chuck says, “only it was hard to figure out what to even call it. It’s like, taking ordinary comments or jokes as accusations, pretty much.”

Is Mike supposed to pretend they’re _not_ accusations? That he doesn’t notice, or doesn’t care, that his friends keep pointing out all the ways he’s always screwing up? He doesn’t think he can do that.

“Okay,” Dutch says, clever fingers moving on to another spot, pulling up the old tape and gauze. “Mike, can you tell us what’s goin’ on right now?”

Mike opens his eyes, frowns. “You guys are helping me out with the thorn scratches and stuff.” What, is this a test? He knows he’s awake, he’s got this one, for once.

“No,” Dutch says patiently, “I mean in your head.”

Mike tries not to flinch, but doesn’t quite manage to clamp down on it.

“Like that,” Dutch goes on. “What’s got you all twisted up right now? I mean, I know it’s something the parasite left behind, nothin’ you’re doin’ on purpose, but what is it? Looks almost like you’re scared of something. You’re not—" His hand settles on Mike’s shoulder again, light and almost cautious. “Are you scared of us?”

“No!” Mike says, startled. Sure, being in a small space with them is a little unnerving for more than one reason, but none of that stuff with the knives was real, he didn't have any new scars afterward. He’s fine, he’s not thinking about that. They're not gonna _kill_ him here, he _knows_ that.

Chuck starts working on a gouge just above Mike’s knee. “Okay, so what is it?” he says. “Normally when I scold you for not taking care of yourself, you just laugh it off.”

Mike flinches hard at that, can’t help the rush of shame and guilt, and Dutch makes a quiet, thoughtful noise.

“Like that,” he says, stroking Mike’s shoulder. “What’s up, what are you thinkin’ right now makes that so bad to hear?”

Mike swallows. They’re both touching him, careful and soft even when they’re easing stuck bits of gauze out of cuts, and they’re being so patient and gentle with him even though he knows their patience has been worn to the breaking point for a while now, and it’s all _really nice_. He doesn’t want to say the wrong thing, push it too far. He’s not sure how much leeway this second chance thing gives him.

He also doesn’t get why they’re acting like they don’t know what he did wrong, but maybe it’s a test. He’s got to prove he remembers what they’ve said: that he’s been taking all this seriously, even with the nightmares and all— and he plans to do better.

“I— I know it’s irresponsible, not doing this stuff for myself,” he says as steadily as he can. “It puts a burden on you guys and it’s not fair. A responsible person doesn’t expect other people to do things for him all the time, and I— I’m trying to get better about it, I am! But I— you guys are— I wouldn’t have asked you to do this,” he says, a little desperate, “only you’re right, I can’t reach my own back, s-so—"

“Okay,” Dutch says, putting both hands on the backs of Mike’s shoulders. “Take a breath, man, try to relax some, okay? You didn’t even ask, remember, _I_ asked _you_ if we could help.” He steps around beside Mike to look at him. “Now, where’d this all come from? Where us doin’ things for you is a burden on us? Did someone say that, or are you just thinkin’ it?”

Mike looks at him in bewilderment, looks down at Chuck, who’s frozen open-mouthed in the middle of smoothing down a fresh bandage on Mike’s thigh. “I— you guys have all been pretty clear about this stuff, I mean— I’m c-careless and immature and selfish and irresponsible and I don't _think_ —”

Dutch and Chuck are suddenly talking over each other, cutting him off.

“Mikey, _no,_ ” Chuck is saying, distressed, “you’re not any of that stuff, you’re _great_ , okay, oh my god—”

“Are you tryin’ to tell me,” Dutch says at the same time, “that _we’re_ the ones who said all that crap to you? That made you this jumpy? That is so wrong, man— I’m gonna find Kaia and punch her right in her messed up face.”

None of this is making sense. Mike stares from one to the other, completely lost.

“Bro,” Chuck says, “we would never really say that stuff, it was a dream.” He’s still crouched by Mike’s feet with one hand forgotten on his thigh— comforting— and Mike swallows again, thinking of rare, good dreams. No, keep it together, don’t get distracted.

“You gotta believe me, Mikey,” Chuck goes on, “you’re like the opposite of selfish and we _know_ that!”

“Yeah, I don’t think anybody could say you’re not responsible,” Dutch adds. “And the other stuff is just _mean_ , jeez. You're our friend!”

Mike licks his lips and keeps searching their faces. It can’t have been a dream. The one thread running through most of Mike’s memories of the past few weeks, the one piece of continuity that never wavered, was his friends finally letting him know what they really thought of him. That’s the one thing he’s been really sure about the whole time. If this Dutch and Chuck don’t remember that…

Then _this_ has to be the dream, doesn’t it? Except it feels so _real_ , he would swear nothing’s felt as real as today in a long time.

Wrestling with it, Mike takes a deep breath and sways a little, suddenly dizzy and exhausted. He reaches out and grabs Dutch’s shoulder, clinging for balance as most of his remaining energy seems to run down his legs and out the soles of his feet.

“Sorry,” he says, faintly. “I should maybe sit down. Um...”

They help him down to the tile floor, but Dutch doesn’t want him leaning back against the wall when his back isn’t done yet, so he ends up sitting between Chuck’s legs, leaning forward against his chest, head pillowed on Chuck’s bony shoulder, face pressed against Chuck's neck. Chuck squeaks, takes a breath, and asks him to turn his head the other way, which Mike does, mumbling apologies that are dismissed before he can quite get them out of his mouth. Then it’s just the tug of tape on his back, little twinges of pain as Dutch does stuff with the cuts, and the warmth and comfort of gentle hands on him.

Mike falls asleep in minutes.

*

“Mikey?” Chuck says quietly. Mike murmurs a little in his sleep and subsides again.

“Don’t wake him,” Dutch says. He’s almost done rebandaging the place the parasite was embedded, and then they’ll just have to see if they can shift Mike to do his chest without waking him.

“He slept for like _sixteen hours_ , dude, and he's been awake like _one_. How is he asleep again?”

“Maybe because he hasn’t slept longer than a couple hours at a time for at least the past week? And it’s not like that was _restful_ sleep. That thing did a number on his system, it might take him a while to recover. It doesn’t mean he’s _not_ gonna recover,” Dutch adds firmly. “Just that we have to be patient.”

Chuck lets out a heavy sigh. “Yeah. He’s definitely not just… snapping back. And, heck, how can this be even more messed up than it looked? He... he honestly thought we’d said that stuff to him.”

“I know,” Dutch says in a grim tone, and looks Chuck in the slightly-flushed face. “You realize that means we’re all gonna have to be a lot more careful than we’re used to with him. Like, not just bein’ nice to him, we gotta pay attention so we pick up on when he’s runnin’ on a set of messed up rules he got outta those dang dreams. Like ’ _needing help means you’re bein’ a burden on your friends_ ’, for example.”

“Yeah. But _also_ being nice to him,” Chuck says a little fiercely. “Dammit, he’s being so _tentative_ around us. It _sucks_. He looks all…” He stops, searching for a word.

“Fragile,” Dutch murmurs without meaning to. “I mean. Not. You know.”

Chuck bites his lip, hands resting gently on Mike’s bare back. “No, that’s… accurate.”

Dutch swallows and raises his hands. “Here, you want to just lean him back against me? If you got all the ones on his legs already—”

“Yeah, okay.”

Between them they get Mike shifted into Dutch’s lap, which he trusts he carries off with more dignity than Chuck, and Chuck starts changing the bandages on Mike’s chest. He’s a lot less successful at suppressing his blush this time, and Dutch doesn’t bother to hide his amusement.

“Oh my _god_ shut up,” Chuck growls after a few minutes.

Dutch grins wider. “Man, I haven’t said a word.”

“I know exactly what you’re saying and I’m telling you right now, Dutch Gordy, shut the fuck up. I am _so_ not in the mood.”

Dutch snickers. “Just cuddle Mike again for a minute, that’ll put—”

“ _Dutch_ ,” Chuck hisses, and Mike takes a breath and shifts a little. Both of them go guiltily quiet until he stills again.

Chuck shoves his bangs up with the back of one hand to glare at Dutch properly.

Dutch shakes his head. “I don’t get why you’re so worked up about it, man,” he says very quietly. “We _all_ think he’s hot, you know? And yeah, it sucks that he’s kinda oblivious, but he’s an easy-going guy, it’s not like he’d be upset if he did figure you out. Heck, I bet you he’d be—”

“Shut _up_ ,” Chuck says, quiet but intense. “This is a _really stupid_ time to even joke about this stuff, do you get that? Dutch, _think_ a minute. That stuff we said to him in his dreams, he got to where he _believes_ it. Who the hell knows what else he’s started to believe. Did you notice how startled he was every time we were— fucking— _reasonably decent people?_ ”

Dutch blows out a breath, equal parts sheepish and defensive. “...Yeah. Okay. So maybe don't make your move on him right now,” he says. “Pretty obviously a bad plan.”

“Yeah,” Chuck says. “Because if he said yes, I’d be scared to think why.”

Dutch gives him a disturbed look. “You don’t think he was dreamin’ about…”

“We don’t _know_ yet,” Chuck says. “But even if not, if we were treating him that badly, what if he thinks we’re… in danger of not being his friends anymore, and saying _yes_ would…”

Dutch blinks a few times. “You’re gonna get yourself all twisted up if you keep thinkin’ about that,” he says, and looks down at Mike. Face slack and peaceful, he shows no sign of nightmares yet as he sprawls limply back against Dutch’s chest. Dutch shifts the arm holding him gently in place and raises his free hand to brush too-long bangs out of Mike’s eyes.

“We’ll be careful,” he says, low-voiced. “We’ll help him, he’ll be okay.”

Chuck takes a deep breath and nods, smoothing the last bandage into place. “We better.”


	3. Chapter 3

Mike wakes up slowly, feeling unusually warm and comfortable. He’s somewhere soft. There’s a quiet, gentle conversation going on nearby. Whatever he was dreaming about— driving? Maybe— is fading away, increasingly unreal, increasingly obviously a dream.

He opens his eyes, finally, and his heart kicks hard in his chest, then starts to race. He’s on the rec room couch. He hasn’t fallen asleep here in— weeks, probably, no, he— he can’t remember falling asleep on this couch in _months_. Texas’s birthday, they had an all-night games tournament, way before Mike started screwing everything up. Why is he _here_ , how did he get here, what has he forgotten now? And how much of what he remembers is wrong?

 _Getting that second chance_ , he thinks. It was so unreal, even if it felt solid at the time, it had to be a dream. It didn’t fit. He didn’t deserve it, anyway, just blaming everything on some monster and skipping out on his responsibility for himself.

…He’s still got some bandages on. Huh. The Terra vines— maybe— or maybe this is just more of that dream. He can’t tell anymore, he can’t be sure even of the stuff he feels most confident about.

Maybe he should just… admit it to everyone. Chuck was right, he’s too crazy, he’s dangerous now. There isn’t any coming back from the point where you can’t even _guess_ what’s real. He is totally and unsalvageably broken.

 _Where am I gonna live?_ he wonders. What’s he going to do?

“Mike?” Julie asks, and Mike flinches back against the cushions. The sudden movement pulls on his cuts, not that the pain means anything. All his nightmares hurt lately. And he just— he’ll tell them, he will, he has to, but not _now_ , he didn’t want to do it _now,_ he’s such a coward.

“…Mike, are you okay?”

“Y-yeah,” he lies. _Traitor_ , he thinks. They’re not safe with him now. This is wrong. He takes a harsh, shaking breath, steels himself, and goes, “ _No._ I need to quit the Burners.”

There’s a long silence. When he makes himself look up at Julie she’s just sitting there, hands folded, with a small, thoughtful frown. Not looking triumphant, or vindicated, or even relieved, and she’s been the loudest about trying to get Mike to stand down, even more than Chuck, she’s the one who's been trying the hardest of anyone to get him to admit he’s so wrecked he can't even handle changing a flat tire anymore, let alone leading the Burners. She's the one who's pushing him to see sense, to give up, make the right call for everyone. And, yeah, now that she’s living down here she’ll make a better leader than him, he has to admit that, but he doesn’t _want_ to leave—

“Could you tell me why, Mike?” Julie asks. Her voice is very level.

Mike takes an unsteady breath, bites his lip, tries not to go _haha, never mind, sorry!_

“…You were right,” he says carefully. “About… pretty much everything. So I’ll quit. It's your show now.”

She nods slowly. “Do you know where you are right now?” she asks. “Can you tell me what’s happening?”

“No,” Mike admits. “I don’t… I can’t— figure it out, this time, it feels real, I can’t— think, I don’t remember why I’m on the couch, I didn’t fall asleep here— I don’t know if I did, I mean, I can’t remember.” His voice keeps cracking. “You were right, okay, Jules— _Julie_ , sorry, I mean, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m losing it. You were right.”

“Mike—”

“I’ll get my stuff,” he says desperately. “You won’t have to throw it out or anything. I’ll figure it out. I can do that. I’m still good for that. I can pack up.”

 _This isn’t real_ , Mike thinks. _You’re gonna have to do it over and over and over until you do it where it IS real,_ and he wants, very badly, to start screaming.

“Let’s take it back a couple steps, cowboy,” Julie says. She hasn’t called him that in awhile, not since she started getting fed up with him, and he blinks, surprised. “I don’t actually know what you think I said. For example, I don’t want you to leave the Burners. I think that’d be pretty bad, actually.”

Mike shakes his head, defeated. _Over and over_ , he thinks. “This isn’t real right now,” he says. “It— it feels— but it’s not fitting together, you _do_ want me to leave, it’s all you’ve been _saying_ for weeks, I’m a liability, I just make things harder for you guys.”

Julie’s shaking her head, eyes narrow, calculating. “Do you remember the Terra parasite?” she asks.

Mike frowns. “Yeah…” Two memories come strung together, one brighter and more certain than the other, Chuck and Dutch being all patient and relaxed with him, explaining about the parasite, giving him a second chance. Those two followed by this makes a significant piece of continuity, scales back his certainty that this is a dream— if Julie’s even talking about the same thing.

“I still don’t know if it was real or not,” he admits in a low voice. “I don’t think it was.”

“Well, mutant plants that give you nightmares are pretty weird, I can see the confusion, but so are spore bombs that show you your fears, so.” Julie shrugs. “It was real. Dutch says you’ll probably have a scar where it was, not that the middle of your own back’s an easy place to get a look.” She stops and studies him for a moment while he tries not to shrink back under her attention.

“It _was_ real, and so is this,” she says quietly.

He wants to believe her so much. It would be so nice to think he’s forgiven, even conditionally, and if it really was the plant’s fault that Mike’s been messing everything up, he could make this chance stick, he knows he could. But the thought of believing, of giving in and hoping, and then waking up for real eventually— that would break something in him, he thinks. Assuming there’s any part of him that’s not broken yet.

Looking down, he nods.

“You don’t believe me,” she says. “Is there anything that would convince you? Besides me saying something stupid about how you should leave the Burners, because sorry, boss, if that’s what it takes, it’s not going to work. You’re a great leader when you're firing on all cylinders, and we need you, and if that dumb Terra version of me in your dreams was telling you anything different she was full of it.”

Mike’s head comes up and he stares. The words take a moment to register, and then he has to close his eyes and breathe deep to keep control as tentative warmth shivers through his chest. It’s… good to hear, even if this is a dream, it’s really, really good.

“I… I don’t know,” he answers after a minute to pull himself together. “I— it helps if I wake up where I fell asleep, that way I can kind of— keep the dreams separate from what’s on either side, sometimes.”

When he looks up she’s staring at him. “Is _that_ why you were sleeping in all those weird corners! That’s really smart. A built-in reality tagging mechanism.”

Mike shrugs awkwardly. He wasn’t expecting praise. He’s not really sure how to deal with it. How smart it was doesn’t matter when it wasn’t enough, does it?

“So that’s why you were so worried about not having fallen asleep here?” Julie continues. “Chuck and Dutch messed up your sorting system. No wonder you’re confused. Well, they brought you here after checking your cuts and stuff in the bathroom. Chuck thought it might be good to have someone nearby when you woke up, and I was free, but I didn't really want to hang around on the toilet or whatever.”

“Checking my cuts,” Mike repeats, wanting to be clear.

“Yeah, changing the bandages, you know. They say you're healing up pretty well.”

Okay. So the clearer memory with the parasite and the second chance leads straight into now. No gap or mismatch in continuity. That’s definitely something, he can hold on to that.

“Does that help?” Julie says.

Mike looks up at her and realizes, stomach sinking, that it’s too late to hedge his bets and be cautious. A bright little thread of hope has already begun winding through him, despite the danger of believing too soon. He wants it too badly to resist.

“Yeah,” he says, mouth dry. He knows that all the dreams before this have felt exactly this real while he was having them, he knows he can’t trust his judgment, but— he can’t keep telling himself that this is a dream when all his senses disagree, either.

…No, he can. He can be cautious. But he doesn’t want to.

“You don’t have to be sure, you know,” Julie says, tilting her head. “So long as you treat everything like it’s real, it’s okay if you think it might still be a dream. Now that the parasite is gone, you shouldn’t be having its dreams anymore, so it won’t take you too long to figure out that this is real life.”

Mike contemplates that for a moment before shaking his head and sending her a little smile. “Now _that_ sounds too good to be true.”

She grins at him, stands up and comes over to the couch. Mike blinks up at her, unsure. She puts a hand on his shoulder, shakes it gently and Mike has to swallow, eyes wide. As far as he remembers, she hasn’t willingly touched him in weeks, any more than she’s grinned at him or said nice things. The scared part of him waiting for everything to finish crumbling under his feet says _Dream, that’s proof, none of this makes sense with what you know!_ but he’s thinking now, looking past the built-up layers of despair and seeing something new.

If the parasite was real, and was giving him those dreams— he glances down at the bandage on one forearm, one of the cuts he got from fighting the thorn vines, which is from the same continuity— then it would be stupid to expect to go seamlessly from dreams to reality without having to reexamine everything he’s been taking for real.

If the parasite _wasn’t_ real, then nothing he does here matters anyway because in real life, the Burners already hate him and this is just some sad little last-gasp delusion he's clinging to. He’s already lost everything that means anything.

So… maybe there’s no harm in trusting Julie, believing this is real. Might as well enjoy it while he can, if it's not going to last, and hope that somehow it _will._

“I’m so glad you’re gonna be okay, cowboy,” Julie says, and steps back. “We were worried. But it sounds like you had some ways to cope we didn’t even know about. Chuck’s going to want to hear all about that— you feel like coming out to the garage to hang out awhile?”

Mike licks his lips and nods. Dutch and Chuck are giving him a second chance in this continuity, he reminds himself, so as long as he keeps a grip and cooperates and doesn’t do anything too obnoxious they’ll probably take it easy on him. If Texas is there… he _might_ agree to the second chance idea. And if not, well, three out of four of his friends going easy on him is still pretty good.

Mike’s boots are next to the couch and his jacket is draped over the back of it. He gets both on and puts his hands in his pockets, touches the cool, smooth shape of the little chrome skull there. It settles him a little more, and he nods again, almost confident.

*

Dutch combing through Whiptail’s code with Chuck for whatever it is that’s got his baby’s front left speaker cone out of sync. He’s also pretending like he doesn’t notice how Chuck’s checking the garage entrance every two seconds, when Julie comes in trailing Mike like the world's shyest little kicked puppy.

“Hey, guys,” she calls, faking casual, like Chuck didn’t notice they were there and straighten up so fast he almost knocked his head into Dutch’s. “Mike’s up, so we’re gonna hang out here for awhile, okay?”

“Yeah, that’s fine,” Dutch says, trying to match her tone. Apparently the new plan is _stay cool and don’t freak Mike out even more_ … _somehow_. “Chuck, that’s fine, right?”

“Uh— yeah, good to see you— you two,” Chuck says, staring hungrily at Mike, who’s staring pretty much everywhere else.

Mike makes as if to slink off towards the far wall, but Julie herds him sharply back towards them and sits with him on one of Whiptail’s spare balloon tires. Mike sits on the very edge, looking less exhausted than usual but a whole lot more jittery, fussing with his hands, bouncing one knee. Julie looks really worried under the fake chill.

“Hey, so, Chuck,” she says. “I heard you were working through that list, with Mike? I was talking to him about it a little, and he’s got some more stuff to go into with you guys.”

Mike flinches _,_ of course. Julie touches his arm right away, kind of apologetic, but he doesn’t look any less unhappy.

“I did say I’d quit— I mean, for now, maybe just for now, if you guys— while I’m—”

“No, the other stuff,” she says firmly. “We’re shelving the whole issue of you quitting for now, okay? I meant the way you’ve been tracking your dreams, dude.”

Chuck glances back at Dutch, who mouths _quitting??? WHAT?_ and gives him an equally freaked out grimace.

Mike blinks and looks maybe fractionally calmer, looking over at Dutch and Chuck. “Oh, right. You said Chuck would want to— okay. Uh. I mean, I already told him some stuff… earlier,” he gives Chuck a worried look and Chuck nods quickly. Mike relaxes a little and Dutch realizes he was checking that was real, that Chuck remembered too.

“About, like, continuity and stuff.”

“Right,” Chuck says, flicking up another screen and typing something. “You tried to keep track of what fit in with previous dreams and what fit with reality, right?”

“Yeah,” Mike says slowly, frowning a little.

“Am I missing something?” Chuck says, and when Mike hesitates, “Come on, bro, you’re the only one who knows this stuff. I won’t know much unless you fill me in.”

Mike looks down, nods and takes a breath. “If I go to sleep— went to sleep. And woke up in the same place I’d gone to sleep, I’d know—”

“—The parts in between were dreams?” Chuck guesses, typing fast, and Mike nods. “Clever! Oh, crap, did we mess you up?” Chuck ducks his head, one hand shoving through his hair in dismay while the other moves over his screen. “Twice in a row, god, but we didn’t want to leave you on the bathroom floor…”

“I, no, I mean, yeah, thanks,” Mike shrugs and shakes his head. “It’s not a big deal. It’s fine.”

“Next time you pass out on us,” Dutch says firmly, and Mike flinches again, eyes wide on him. Dutch raises a soothing hand. “—Man, no, it’s okay, I’m just sayin’ we’ll wake you up before moving you, okay? Make sure you wake up in the same place you go to sleep. Or leave a note. Would that be better?”

Mike hunches, drops his eyes again. “You guys don’t have to do that,” he says in a low voice.

“We’re gonna do it anyway, pal,” Julie says, patting his shoulder, “because we like you and we want to.”

“And it’s not even a big deal,” Dutch says. “It’s not like all that stuff you were sayin’ the other night about bein’ a burden and not doin’ things for yourself, okay? Totally not true and not what’s goin’ on here.”

The look in Mike’s eyes is mostly bewildered, but he nods slowly anyway, looking around at the three of them.

“Okay,” Chuck says, sounding relieved. “What else, Mikey?”

Mike glances at Julie, who nods encouragingly. “Uh,” he says. “I guess— I tried to sleep in different places as often as I could, cuz that made it easier to separate—” he waves a hand vaguely and Chuck cuts in again.

“No, of course, one waking period from the next because you gave them different start points, that’s— really smart, dude!” He’s looking at Mike, fingers moving a little slower, and Dutch wonders if the admiring tone registers at all with Mike.

Chuck seems to notice a second later that he’s being kind of blatant and goes pink, bending closer to his screen. “I mean,” he mumbles, “it’s just a real nice adaptation, is all. Um. Anything else?”

Mike blinks at him and his mouth softens, some. Dutch lets out a silent breath and catches Julie’s eye. She gives him a subtle little nod, just as pleased as he is to see Mike relaxing, even if she hides it better.

“I guess just what we talked about before,” Mike says. “Keeping track of how things hung together, if, like, this was the set of dreams with the whole,” he turns one palm up, “plague thing and everybody dying, or if it was the monster invasions, or, uh, the knives time, or, or whatever. If I could track how what was going on fit into a larger picture, figure out which one it was consistent with, it was easier to remember if it was a dream or not.”

“Wait,” Chuck says, looking over at him again, “ _set_ of dreams. So, like, there was more than one series of dreams that held internal consistency? And you were trying to track both those series and reality?”

“Uh. Yeah?”

“Holy crap, dude,” Chuck says, hands dropping from his screen. “How, uh, any idea how many different dream series you were juggling?”

“Oh, geez. I mean, I didn’t really write up a list.” Mike pulls a face, runs his hand over the back of his neck. “Um, let’s see. There was the plague one, and the one where I s-screwed up bad and Kane won, and the one— I think there were actually _two_ different continuities with the invading monsters, like sometimes I’d lost a leg and sometimes not, sometimes the monsters were big and toothy and sometimes they were like, mutant rats’ poisonous cousins and they were hiding in the walls.” He pauses, frowning at his knees, one hand flexing idly. "And, um. The one with, um. The knives. That one was always easy to tell. Because you all had knives."

“Holy crap,” Chuck says faintly, typing away, and clears his throat. “Okay, that’s five. You were tracking five different _realities_ , pretty much, six counting, you know, the real world.”

“Oh, no, I mean, there were definitely more than that,” Mike says, startled. "Those were just like, the big ones. Like, there were— floods, and lava, and that ice monster machine again, and the worm disease, all kinds of disasters 'n junk. But they didn't go on so long, you know?"

“There’s the one where I apparently was dumb enough to want you to quit the Burners,” Julie offers, and Mike blinks at her, then squints like he’s been struck by a thought.

“Huh,” he says slowly. “Yeah. Sort of. I mean, no, not, um, not really,” he gives her an apologetic grimace, “that was actually, um, kind of a common theme through most of the realistic sets and some of the unrealistic ones.”

Julie blows out a breath, puffing out her cheeks. “Well, dang.”

Mike ducks his head a little, looking around at them all, wary again. “That’s what makes it tricky to untangle,” he explains. “Trying to figure out what continuities you guys _didn’t_ want me to clear out, already.”

“This one,” Dutch says firmly. “In case you weren’t clear on that. We definitely want to keep you around, here, you’re kinda important.”

“To us,” Chuck adds, and then flushes and tacks on quickly, “and to the team!”

Mike blinks at him, looks at Dutch and over to Julie, and slowly smiles. There’s a light coming into his face that Dutch hasn’t seen in ages, warm and soft and astonished. Dutch swallows hard and smiles back. Chuck is chewing on his lip, smiling at his screen like the cutest dork, and Julie elbows Mike gently in the side and grins at him as he laughs a little.

“Thanks,” he says quietly, and dang it, how heartbreaking is it that he’s so purely happy just to hear that tiny piece of reassurance? God.

There’s a moment where they all sit there smiling at each other, and then Chuck coughs and tries to get back on track. “Okay, so you were keeping up with multiple different realities— or, like, storylines or something— all at the same time, tracking the details to slot each dream into the appropriate place, have I got that right?” He sounds weirdly excited, and when Mike nods he throws up his hands and starts waving them around. “No, but see that’s _amazing_ , because like, ideally speaking that’s _exactly_ what you’d want to do if you were playing a game and somebody was using mind magic and your character fell prey to it! Track the similarities and differences, notice incongruities, figure out what’s consistent and build on that! I mean, I don’t think even the most sadistic DM would throw as many different versions at you as that stupid plant did, but you kept it all straight anyway!”

Mike’s half-smile looks pained, now. “I didn’t, though, I mean, I don’t know what’s real. If I’d actually been able to slot everything into the right place, I’d be way less confused right now.”

“Oh come _on!_ ” Chuck says, exasperated, and Mike’s smile vanishes as he pulls into himself from where he’s been slowly spreading out the last few minutes. Chuck stops short. “Mikey, no, I didn’t mean— I’m not annoyed, it’s, you’re fine, bro, I swear. Please relax?”

Mike licks his lips and nods cautiously, losing at least an edge of the tension curling him tighter.

Chuck lets out a breath and runs a hand through his hair. “All I meant was, like, _no one_ could expect to do that perfectly, dude, and you had like a _million_ different disasters to keep up with, and you figured the whole thing out by _yourself_ , you didn’t even have a _manual!_ ”

Mike is unfolding again, listening carefully, dark eyes intent on Chuck’s face.

Chuck flails his hands again, shaking his head a little wildly. “I’m just— that’s _crazy_ , okay, that’s like ridiculous levels of, of logic and analysis and levelheadedness under pressure, correlating and comparing and retaining all that information…” He trails off suddenly, looks over at Dutch, who’s wearing the same smirk Julie’s got on, and huffs, flushing dark this time. “Oh my god, you guys, stop it,” he grumbles, crossing his arms and looking away.

Breaking into a full grin, Dutch leans over and whispers in Chuck’s ear, “ _Sapiosexual_ ,” and Chuck makes a strangled noise and smacks at him, bright red.

Dutch leans away, grinning his head off. Not his fault that if Chuck gets any more turned on over Mike’s brain they’re gonna have to hose the guy down. His computer parts might overheat.

Mike has mostly relaxed now, blinking between them and smiling a little, still bewildered. “I don't think it was _that_ impressive,” he says. “I mean, it was just about trying to stay on top of things.”

“Oh my god, dude,” Chuck starts, catches Julie’s eye and abruptly stops, shoulders hunching around his scarlet ears as he determinedly focuses on his screen. “It totally _is_ impressive,” he mutters, trying to ignore her and Dutch until the teasing stops being a thing. "Anyone would be impressed. Shut up."

Still smirking like a fiend, Julie leans an elbow on Mike’s shoulder and says, “Definitely impressive. Like, you could even say it's  _exciting_.” It's probably not enough for Mr. Oblivious himself to get it, but Chuck lets out a choked squeak and twitches hard enough to put his hand through his screen and short it out.

“Julie I _swear!_ ”

Unfortunately, since Mike doesn’t know what the teasing’s about, that leaves him free to make assumptions. Dutch sees his smile fall and the way he pulls in again, just slightly, and holds out a hand to the poor guy.

“No, hey, man, we’re just messin’ with Chuck, but he’s right, okay? For real, the stuff you figured out to keep it together through all that is _dang_ impressive, no question. Like, it’s just really cool, all the ways you were workin’ to keep your feet under you. Chuck’s not the only one who’s wowed, over here, I am too.”

Julie pats him gently, looking rueful. “And me. I don’t think I would’ve done as well.”

Mike looks from Dutch to Julie, wide-eyed. “Of course you would’ve, Ju— Julie, that’s— I mean, you guys are way smarter than me, any of you would’ve done way better!”

“Not so sure about that,” Dutch says.

“Very not sure about that,” Julie agrees.

“Absolutely sure not,” Chuck adds flatly. “Smarts wouldn’t have been enough, bro. If I’d been dealing for the last couple weeks with the kind of nightmares you’ve been talking about, I’m pretty sure I’d be dead.”

Mike draws back, looking unsettled. "No, I— no," he says, and folds his hands tightly between his knees. "No, you're not, you wouldn't."

Chuck winces, obviously thinking about all the crap Mike's just been through where one or another of them probably  _did_ bite it, and says, “All I’m saying is, you did good, okay? You did really, really good.”

Mike looks around at the three of them again and that sweet, cautious smile spreads wider this time, lighting up his face. “Oh,” he says. “I… huh. I thought I was failing pretty hard, it didn’t seem like any of it was, y’know, fixing anything, but it— I really didn't do too bad? I did okay?”

“Man, you did incredible!” Dutch says. “I know it’s been rough on you, but lay off yourself a little, yeah?”

“Some things you can’t fix by yourself,” Julie says. “You survived that plant messing with your whole sense of reality, and you did it _intact_. We’re not just throwing around words like ‘impressive’ for the fun of it, you know.”

Mike glances from face to face, looking grateful and overwhelmed at the same time. It's painful, how intense his relief is, how he so obviously doesn't know what to do with himself.  

“How are you feeling now?” Chuck asks hesitantly.

Mike jerks up straighter. “Fine! I’m good, I’m okay.”

Something in Dutch’s chest aches, seeing the tension so close to the surface, Mike’s eyes just slightly too wide, his smile already fading away again.

“You know,” Dutch says, “you don’t have to be.”

Mike’s brows pull in. “Huh?”

“This isn’t supposed to be an interrogation or somethin’. You don’t have to answer all our questions right now, we can just chill for a while if you want.”

Biting his lip, Mike looks around at them again, then stares at his knees, frowning. “No,” he says after a bit. “You guys have things you need to know, and I’ve got some stuff I— I need to. Ask about. But I—” He looks up again and he looks half worried, half hopeful. “C-can I get— can one of you— just if you wanted—” he starts, and just hangs there, mouth open, biting his lip every time he starts to speak, then trying again.

“Get what, bro?” Chuck says, watching anxiously. “You gotta tell us when you need stuff, because we want to help, but we don’t know what you need.”

Mike drops his gaze back to his knees. “A h-hug,” he says very quietly.

“Oh yeah?” Julie says, and puts her arms around him. “You want _one?_ ” she says, catching Dutch’s and Chuck’s eye, “Or three?”

Eyes wide and startled, Mike looks over at Julie and nods hard. Dutch and Chuck surge forward to make it a hug pile. Julie yelps and snickers and Mike laughs a little damply and the three of them hold him tight between them.

Dutch kind of expects Mike to enjoy it a minute, then start giving off _okay cool but space now_ signals, but he doesn’t. He just clings to them, forehead against Dutch’s shoulder, and breathes carefully.

Some part of Dutch apparently keeps thinking Mike will snap back to normal any minute now, and keeps being surprised by how very much he’s not doing that. This isn’t normal, but it makes perfect sense, and he really needs to stop being startled by it.

“It’s okay,” Julie says quietly. “Just relax, okay? We don’t mind.”

Mike goes still, then says, sounding definitely a little throaty and choked, “I-I wasn’t— you guys don’t have to—”

“Mikey, jeez,” Chuck sighs, and starts stroking his hair. "Take it easy, man. We want to." Mike’s shoulders shake as he lets out a cracked noise, hand clutching at the back of Dutch’s shirt.

“Seriously, man,” Dutch says, just as quiet, “you’ve kinda been through a lot. You’re allowed to take a minute, you know? You’re allowed to take… a lot of minutes.”

Mike sobs once, hand kneading and tugging at Dutch’s shirt, but he’s shaking his head. “It was hard for you guys too, though,” he gasps. “I can’t make you guys— pick up the pieces— over and, and _over_ —”

“You’re not _making_ us do anything,” Julie says firmly. “We’re doing this because we want to. It’s not like it’s a hardship.”

“You don’t have to worry about us right now, bro,” Chuck says, “we’re fine. You can relax, it’s okay. You did good. We're, um. Really proud of you.”

Mike makes a choked noise and gives in at that, starts shaking in between them, letting out hard, shuddering breaths. Dutch’s shoulder is getting damp, and the back of his shirt is gonna be all stretched out the way Mike is clinging to it, but he doesn’t give a single damn. His own eyes sting, and he has to breathe carefully past the lump in his throat.

God, all the stuff Mike was dealing with, the past few weeks, and he was so brave about it, so smart and determined. Even though he didn’t know what was wrong and if things would ever be okay again, when he was struggling with it all by himself because his friends didn’t know— Dutch swallows and makes himself stop thinking about it. It’s not going to do Mike any good if Dutch busts out crying, too.

It takes a while for Mike to get through it, more than a little pain and misery stored up and demanding an outlet. Dutch and the other two just hold him, stroking his back, Chuck running fingers through his hair, and eventually the shaking gasps ease and stop. Mike goes quiet and kind of limp, and everyone stays still for a few minutes.

“Sorry,” he says in a low voice, "aw, no, your shirt—" finally pulling away, wiping his face with his hands. Dutch moves back a little and so does Chuck and Julie.

"It's cool, dude," he says. 

"But I'm—"

“Nope!” Julie says brightly. “No apologies. We already said it was fine, you don’t need to apologize.”

“I’ve caused you guys enough trouble, though,” Mike says, eyes down.

“Man, you really haven’t,” Dutch says. “You’re not trouble, all right? You’re our friend.”

Mike looks up at him, searching his face, nods and drops his head again. It’s less like he agrees than like he’s recently learned better than to argue.

“You look kind of tired again, bro,” Chuck says. “I think Dutch had a good idea, maybe we should leave the question and answer period for another time and just— like, hang out, right now. Does that sound okay?”

Mike looks up again and nods, but Dutch can’t read his closed expression, can’t tell if he’s relieved or upset or just going along with what they want. Pressing him for his real opinion seems like a bad idea, though.

Chuck and Dutch poke a little more at Whiptail’s code, chatting with Julie, snarking at each other, and Mike slowly relaxes again, listening to them. He doesn’t join in on the banter, and aside from Julie nudging him a few times to invite him in on a joke, they don’t include him in the friendly sniping. Right now it’s too difficult to tell what he might take wrong.

He sits and listens, smiling a little, and it’s not normal, yet, not even that close to it. But better than it has been by a long shot.

Remembering how fast he tired out the last time he was awake, Dutch keeps an eye on him for the next handful of hours, waiting for him to droop and pass out. He doesn’t until after dinner, though, which seems like an improvement. Maybe sleeping sixteen hours and then almost a full day has him catching up on his sleep debt. Dutch prods him awake when he finally starts to sag, and helps him up to his room so he won’t pass out on the stairs.

To make sure he knows where this fits into his continuities, Dutch writes him a note and leaves it on the nightstand, since no one’s going to sit up all night just to be here when he wakes up. Well, Chuck would probably volunteer, but Dutch isn’t giving him the option.

“Sleep well, okay? Sweet dreams,” Dutch says, holding the door.

“Yeah,” Mike says, smiling ruefully. He looks up. “Hey, Dutch? Thanks.”

“Anytime, man,” Dutch says, smiling at him, and steps out, pulling the door closed.


	4. Chapter 4

Mike wakes up in bed, and the memory of getting into bed last night is bright and immediate when he checks. He glances over and the note Dutch left for him to read this morning is folded up on the nightstand right where he remembers it being. Continuity confirmed. This is the one where he gets a second chance and all his friends are being nice, but also sort of confused and cautious around him. Like they don’t quite trust him to keep it together. He’s just got to prove he can do it.

…All his friends but Texas. Mike didn’t see him yesterday, hasn’t run into him since they got rid of the parasite.

Haha, wouldn’t it be funny if Texas was just part of the dreams, if he’d never been real.

…Well, no, actually. It wouldn’t be funny at all, because Mike likes the guy a lot even if _he_ doesn’t have much use for _Mike_ these days. Also, Texas and the others were a constant, they never stopped being around except in the ones they were dead. Oh, and when Chuck was talking through the dreams the first time Mike woke up yesterday, he mentioned Texas. The water fight when they were washing the cars, that was real.

It is way too early in the day to be thinking about Texas in a soaking-wet white tank, though, so Mike rolls out of bed and goes to shower. When he gets back he has to pause in the middle of getting dressed to read Dutch’s note, because the stupid piece of him that’s convinced the note is just a cruel prank has finally gotten too loud to ignore.

The note says:

 _Hey, Mike—_  
_\- We got that parasite burr thing off you, it was giving you nasty nightmares_  
_\- Nobody wants you to quit the Burners_  
_\- Unfortunately the spinach brownies we found in the freezer are real_  
_\- I have no idea how you and Chuck eat those things_  
_\- No one is mad at you, we all like you a lot_  
_Dutch_

Mike reads it, and then he has to sit down and read it some more and try not to be an idiot crying over a dumb note. It’s just… so friendly, and encouraging, and doesn’t say anything about all the stuff Dutch has been impatient with him over, all the good reasons he has to be mad. Like he’s willing to let it go while Mike is getting his feet back under him. It’s really nice.

Mike breathes for a minute and pulls himself together. He finishes getting dressed, sticks the note in his pocket, and heads down to find something to eat.

He hesitates in the door of the kitchen, because speaking of Texas, the guy’s right there leaning on the counter, shoveling down some weird veggie-mushroom dish. Mike isn’t really considering backing away before Texas sees him, he’s just—taking a minute to breathe before he goes in.

Then Texas glances up at him. “Hey, Tiny!”

That’s a lot more enthusiastic than he’s been about Mike recently, wow. Mike gives him a careful smile, trying to look friendly but not full of himself, and heads for the fridge.

“Hey, Texas.”

Texas stuffs another forkful of mushroom glop into his mouth and keeps talking. “Dutch says all those times you were havin’ bad dreams you were in different worlds or realities or some junk, fightin’ monsters!”

Mike blinks at him over the open fridge door. “Uh… sorta, yeah. Sometimes.” There’s a container of something that looks like egg salad hidden behind some other stuff, and Mike digs it out as a reasonable prospect.

“ _Awesome!_ ” Texas says, and something in Mike’s chest eases, loosens. Looks like Tex is on board with the whole second chance idea.

Smiling more cheerfully, he grabs a spoon and tries the egg salad, which turns out to have kale or cabbage or something hidden in it. Dang it, Jacob. He eats it anyway.

“Was Texas helpin’ you fight ‘em?” Texas goes on. “I bet I was! Did we kick their butts?”

Mike grins into his breakfast. “We sure tried, Te—Texas.”

“Heck yeah! How 'bout zombies, were there any zombies?”

“A couple of times, I guess.” Those dreams had been inconsistent standalones, not hanging together, so they hadn’t bothered him compared to some of the others.

“But it wasn’t us, right?” Texas says. “You didn’t have to fight zombie Texas?”

“Uh—” He’s pretty sure he did, actually, and it didn’t go well for him, but he’s not going to say that. “I don’t remember, dude. I had a _lot_ of dreams.”

“Oh, okay, cool,” Texas says, satisfied. “Cuz zombie Texas would be real tough to beat, and Texas doesn’t want you gettin’ knocked around by any bad guy Texases, that’s just lame. Texas don’t do his friends like that.”

Mike can’t help glancing up at him, startled, because—of course he can’t tell for sure what was real and what wasn’t, and recently Texas has decided Mike’s not worth bothering with, but there have still been a couple of… incidents, in the last week. He’s pretty sure the sparring session where Texas stopped pulling his punches and broke some of Mike’s ribs was a dream, but what about the time he shouldered past and slammed Mike into a doorway? What about the time Texas got fed up with all Mike's excuses and just backhanded him? It’s not like any of it was out of the blue, Mike knew exactly why and kept trying to make up for it, apologize, Texas just didn’t want to hear it.

Maybe this is Texas sort of letting him know he’s going to cut Mike some slack for a while, give him that second chance. Mike gives him a cautious, grateful smile.

“Cool. Thanks.”

“Uh, no problem!” Texas says, looking kind of confused. He swaggers over to the sink and drops in the empty veggie-stuff jar, then comes back to Mike. “Hey, we haven’t sparred for like, ages! We totally oughta do that! You wanna spar some, Tiny?”

He goes to punch Mike in the shoulder—

And Mike knows, he _knows_ it’s a friendly punch this time, but in his mind’s eye there’s a sneer overlaying Texas’s cheerful grin and his fists come down again and again and Mike is dodging away before he can control it, eyes wide and heart racing, free hand ready to block.

Texas stares.

Mike swallows, wrestles himself under control again, smiles shaky and apologetic. “Sorry, man, I guess I’m—”

“Thought you said you didn’t fight zombie Texas,” Texas says, eyes still wide.

“I—I didn’t. I’m just jumpy, sorry.”

“So who was it?” Texas says, coming forward, and Mike has to steel himself not to step back. “What kinda Texas were you fightin’ that’s got you all jumpy now? Mike, it was a dang dream! You’re awake now!”

Mike can’t help flinching. _Shape up, you pathetic wreck_. “I know. I’m… working on it.”

Texas folds his arms, muscles bunching up under his jumpsuit, and keeps staring.

Mike’s not hungry anymore. He sets the egg salad down on the counter and shoves his hands in his pockets.

“The others don’t want me to quit,” he says, half apologizing, half explaining.

Texas frowns, but instead of being furious or disgusted, he just looks bewildered. “Quit what?”

“Quit the Burners,” Mike says, almost as confused. What’s Texas playing at? He’s the one who’s spent days pointing out to the others just how unfit Mike is, after testing him and pushing him and making clear exactly how much he resents Mike’s attitude and always has. Mike never realized how constantly angry Texas was with him until Texas stopped hiding it.

“Uh,” Texas says, eyes widening. “Good! You don’t gotta quit, Tiny, you’re fine now! Dutch and Chuck fixed it, right, you’re done with all the monsters and stuff, you beat ‘em!”

Mike stares at him, studies his face, runs over the words again. Coming from the Texas he’s finally gotten to know, who’s sick of pretending Mike is worth his cooperation or his respect, they don’t make any sense. But Mike _knows_ this is real, it connects up right and the other continuities are fading in his memory with time, the plague and the monsters and those. This has to be reality, there aren’t any other contenders.

The only thing that makes sense is that Texas is pretending everything’s fine, trying to go back to how it was. Which on the one hand sounds okay, maybe even like a good thing, and on the other is horrible. Maybe it’s another sign of how weak and pathetic Mike is, but he can’t handle the thought of trying to act like he used to around Texas, not now that he knows how arrogant he was, what a high-handed jerk he was being to his friends. 

When he doesn’t say anything, Texas frowns. “You wanna quit the Burners? Really?” he says, looking really convincingly dismayed.

Mike shakes his head. “No, _you_ want me to. And— I mean, dude, I offered, I _did,_ you can ask Julie! I  _did._ ”

Texas just sort of _stops_ for a moment, mouth open, brow furrowed. Then a realization dawns and he smacks a fist into the palm of his hand.

“Ohhh, I get it! There _was_ an Evil Dream Texas, and he was real sneaky, so sneaky you couldn’t even tell he wasn’t the real thing! Dang, Tiny, that’s rough. Well, check it out,” he points at himself with both thumbs, coincidentally flexing his biceps. “This is the real deal, the true Texas, right here, front and center, who definitely isn’t evil and will totally defend you against anybody who is! With his awesome ninja fists!”

Texas goes into one of his posing, flexing, _ka-chaw_ ing routines while Mike watches in confusion.

“Wait,” he says after a long moment filled with rippling muscles and martial arts noises. “Texas, are you saying you don’t want me to quit anymore because I—because the nightmare thing’s over?”

Texas blinks over at him, holding a pose. “Uh, dude, I _never_ wanted you to quit. There you go, that’s how you can tell! If he’s some dumb buttface who wants you to quit the Burners, it’s Evil Fake Texas! _Bam!_ ” He throws a punch, presumably knocking out Fake Texas. “If he’s real cool and he acts like your friend and stuff, then it’s real Texas and you’re safe, like now!”

Dropping the last pose, he strides over to Mike, goes to punch him in the arm and stops short, looking him over. Mike thinks he managed not to flinch this time, but he breathes in and tries to smile like everything’s fine, like he’s not tense or on edge or questioning reality at all right now.

Texas unclenches his fist and very gingerly reaches up to pat Mike on the shoulder.

“You’re okay, little guy,” he says awkwardly. “You don’t gotta be scared of Big Texas, okay? I’m not gonna, like, hurt you. Texas don’t hurt his friends, that’s so seriously lame and uncool.”

“Recently you think _I’m_ lame and uncool,” Mike says, not quite steadily.

“No, _Fake_ Texas thinks that, because he’s _dumb!_ ” Texas says hotly. “And if he was here, Texas would kick his face in and then tell him that! He’d be like ‘Mike is lame and stuff!’ and I’d be like ‘No, _you’re_ lame and dumb and _fake_ , I’m the real honest genuine Texas and _I_ think Mike’s great!’”

Getting into the scenario, Texas is gesturing and posing appropriately for the imaginary Texas and then for himself. “And then he’d be like, ‘Not so fast! I have _lasers!_ And big monster claws, and shark teeth!’ And at first Real Hero Texas would be like ‘Oh nooo, lasers!’ cuz he doesn’t have those, and they’re real cool. But then I’d rally, and I’d summon the power of being a cool dude and not being a jerk to your friends, and then Evil Fake Texas would be the one going ‘Oh noooo!’ and all fallin’ over and stuff, and then I’d pick him up with one hand, and I’d throw him in the air, and I’d punch him out of Motorcity! And I’d be like, ‘Don’t come back, loser, Real Texas is here to protect his friends!’ And it’d be awesome,” Texas finishes, folding his arms and nodding proudly. Then he slips Mike a searching, uncertain look and Mike realizes with a jolt that he’s trying to get Mike to laugh, he’s trying to cheer Mike up how he used to.

Mike punches him in the arm, stunned, smiling and maybe blinking a little hard. “It’d be totally great, Real Texas,” he says. “I’d love to see it.”

“Ch’ _yeah_ , right! We could sell tickets and make like a billion dollars, that’s how great it’d be,” Texas says, and punches him back— Mike doesn’t miss how gently he does it, hardly more than a knuckle-bump, and practically in slow-motion. It makes his heart turn over painfully in his chest, that Texas has noticed how weak he is now, how fragile and broken, and isn’t jumping on him for it anymore.

“We could get the Duke to film it,” Mike says. “I bet he could get all the best camera angles on you.”

Texas preens, ostentatiously. “You bet your butt, Tiny. Only the _best_ cameras could even _fit_ all this in!” He slaps his abs and goes “ _Yow!_ ” in a good enough impression of the Duke that it actually does surprise a laugh from Mike, and Texas looks triumphant.

“Yeah!” he enthuses, and slings a heavy arm around Mike’s back. “Let it out, little guy. Texas is a comedy genius in addition to like all the other kinds of super brain-men!”

Mike rests his head against Texas’s hat for a second, still grinning. He  _loves_ this, this continuity. Everything feels so sharp and clear and _good_ and no one’s mad at him. He wants it to be real. It’s going to kill him, he thinks, if it isn’t real.

“You’re the best, Tex,” he says, and then tenses, corrects himself. “—Texas.”

“Darn right,” Texas says, and squeezes him gently. Still not mad. “Hey, can I tell the other guys about like, _worst_ Tex? We gotta let ‘em know there’s some nefarious stuff goin’ down, you know?”

“Uh. What?”

“ _Evil Texas,_ Mike! I mean you know and I know now that the nasty dude’s sneakin’ around waiting to get the drop on you and say all kinds of gnarly junk about quitting the Burners and whatever, and maybe even knockin’ you around with his totally misplaced and unfair Texas Muscularity so you’re all scared, but what if it happens to Chuck?” Texas grimaces. “I mean that guy’s already crazy intimidated by _regular_ Texas. We can’t let Nega-Texas from Jerk Land at him! Wouldn’t be anything left of the poor dude.”

“I don’t think Chuck has to worry about that,” Mike says, trying to follow this line of thought.

“No, he’s gotta,” Texas disagrees. “It’s like his job to worry! I think that’s why we keep him around, _someone’s_ gotta, and if he does we don’t have to.” He taps his forehead sagely. “That’s tactics, Mike.”

Mike frowns. “How ‘bout we tell Julie?” he suggests. “She’s good at… tactics.”

“And she’s got like sneaky doubles too!” Texas says, enthused. “Yeah, that’s using your melon, alright! She’ll know all _about_ evil versions, she used to be like, her own no-good Deluxe twin all that time. _Man_ … hey!”

Texas pulls back suddenly, turning so he can put both hands on Mike’s shoulders. The look on his face is worryingly intense as he searches Mike’s face for something.

“Hey,” he says again. “Hey, Mike. You know friends protect each other, right?”

“Yeah, of course,” Mike says, uneasy all over again.

“And I know you’d protect _us_ , ‘cuz you’re you,” Texas says.

“I’m trying,” Mike says. “Texas, what—”

“Is there an evil Julie,” Texas says. His expression’s got no hint of playfulness in it, he’s deadly serious. “Is that what’s got you so messed up, Tiny? There’s more to it than just Dark Evil Nega Texas The Total Butt-Lord, it’s all of us. There’s been copies of like _all_ the Burners sneakin’ around and tearin’ you up and you been trying to protect like all of them from all of us. And none of us knew until me just now.”

Mike bites his lip. It’s true that he remembers the others saying things that according to them, they never said, but it seems unlikely that _all_ the bad stuff he remembers wasn’t real. He can’t just decide what gets to be real and what doesn’t based on whether he likes it or not, that’s not how anything works. And it’s not like the stuff they said—the stuff he remembers them saying—about him isn’t true. He’s got plenty of flaws, he’s made lots of mistakes, it’s not like he’s that great, or deserving…

“Mike,” Texas says. “Be square with me, bro. You don’t gotta protect _bad_ friends from good ones.”

“…I think _I’m_ the bad friend,” Mike says, and his voice comes out all shaky.

“Oh,” Texas says, quietly. He sniffs, hard. “Oh, dang. _Mike_.” He steps forward and wraps both arms around Mike hard enough to hurt, but Mike wouldn’t want to stop him for anything. Mike dares to put his arms around Texas and hold on, and Texas doesn’t get angry, or push him off, or tell him he’s pathetic. He just hugs Mike, and lets Mike hug him back.

Mike was pretty sure Texas would never be his friend again, as aggressive and angry and dismissive as he’s been to Mike lately, but now Texas is saying none of that was him, it was _all_ the dreams. It seems too good to be true. Mike’s going to have to sort out when Texas was acting like that and try to see if there were any other details that support those pieces not being real, and god, it’s going to be hard to figure out. He can’t afford to mess up or take too long, either, or his friends will—

Except no, they’re all being kind and patient recently. Maybe they won’t get angry if he gets things wrong. They might just… give him the time he needs. Maybe it’ll be okay.

*

Dutch is in the middle of trying to figure out what’s missing from the painting he’s working on, or if it’s just that he’s been staring at it too long, when he hears Texas a little way off.

“Hey, there he is!”

“Oh, he’s painting,” Mike’s voice says quietly. “No, come on, dude, we can’t interrupt him.”

“Tiny, if we did like that, we’d never get to talk to the guy!”

Dutch snorts to himself and pulls off his respirator, turning to put it down. “I was just about ready for a break anyway,” he says. “What’s up?”

Texas jerks a thumb at Mike, who looks hunched and apologetic a step behind him. “Mike’s been dealin’ with Evil Fake Dream Burners, except he didn’t know they were fake cuz they were real stealthy and junk, like dream ninjas! So now, like, he thinks we’ve said real bad stuff to him and been like beating on him and stuff, and—”

“Texas, no,” Mike says, “I know that stuff wasn’t real, no one was beating on me—”

Texas turns on him fast, spreading his arms, and Mike jerks back. “So why are you _scared_ of me?!”

Mike’s mouth opens and closes and he swallows. “I’m s-sorry.”

Texas slumps, tugging his hat brim down over his eyes. “No,” he mutters, “ _Texas_ is sorry. Shouldn’ta yelled.”

Holy crap. Seems like Dutch missed an episode of this show; how the heck did _Texas_ figure this stuff out? Dutch isn’t sure he’s ever seen the guy look this upset, either.

“Hey,” Dutch says, going over to them. “I know we were doin’ bad stuff in Mike’s dreams, you got that right, Texas. But, I mean, we’ve already been tellin’ Mike the stuff we said in those dreams isn’t true. I’m not sure what else we can do. We just gotta convince Mike that we’re not like that and everything’s gonna be okay.”

“Yeah, ‘zactly,” Texas says with a broad shrug. “We gotta tell him we ain’t like that so he’ll believe it! You and Julie and Chuck hafta come help with that, Daddy Texas is makin’ it happen.”

Dutch stares at him. “Uh—”

“Julie’s gettin’ Chuck, so we just gotta get up there and we can do this thing!” Texas says. “Come on, let’s move!” Turning, he claps Mike on the shoulder more gently than Dutch thought he knew how, then tows him along as he strides away. Mike shrugs sort of apologetically at Dutch, who shrugs back and follows.

Chuck and Julie are already sitting in the booth when they get there. Mike slides in first, Dutch follows him, and Texas stays standing.

“All right, Mike’s been fightin’ evil ninja Burners, and we gotta tell him how we’re the good guys and not those jerks!” Texas says, and sits down next to Dutch.

“Okay,” Dutch says, “but how? It’s not like we haven’t been _trying_ to help—”

“But we haven’t been very methodical about it,” Chuck breaks in. He glances at Julie and goes on. “And my idea to catch Mike up on what’s happened was actually backwards. _We_ shouldn’t just tell _him_ stuff, _he_ needs to tell _us_ what happened with him, so we can help him sort out the dreams from reality.”

That does actually make sense, but… it doesn’t sound like much fun for Mike. Dutch glances over at him, and so does everyone else.

He does look a heck of a lot more awake and energetic this morning, almost normal if Dutch ignores the uncertain expression and the way he’s messing with his fingers.

“That sound okay to you, man?” Dutch asks him.

Mike looks around at all of them. “Yeah, if it’s really what you guys want, but, I mean…” He rubs his knuckles across his lips. “I don’t need help with all of them, like I already said, I know a lot of them weren’t real. And some of them, I mean, even if they _seemed_ real, I realized later that they couldn’t be because I don’t have broken ribs, I’m not—that stuff can’t have happened.”

Dutch nods slowly, opening his mouth, but Chuck gets in first.

“Yeah, but Mikey, you were ready to say the water fight was a dream, too. Maybe you should just tell us everything, bro, it’s not like it could hurt.”

Mike’s eyes drop and Dutch frowns. “He shouldn’t have to tell us anything he doesn’t want to.”

“I think that depends on why,” Julie says, eyes on Mike. “If he’s worried he’ll find out something bad really did happen, not telling us kind of defeats the whole purpose. If he’s worried something will make us mad or upset—we won’t get mad, and if you could handle living through this crap, Mike, we can handle hearing about it. Okay?”

Mike looks up at her, chewing on his lip, and glances around. “You guys aren’t gonna like some of it, though, and if I already know it’s a dream, why should you have to—”

“Man, we can deal with it,” Dutch says firmly. “Julie’s right, if you’re just tryin’ to protect us, forget that, tell us what’s been going on. Okay? But, like, if there’s something you straight up don’t want to talk about for _your_ sake, not ours, you don’t have to. Ain’t nobody gonna make you.”

“Sounds fair,” Julie agrees, and Chuck nods.

Mike looks from face to face and nods too, slowly. “There’s a lot, though. Where—I guess I should start with the beginning, huh? As much as I can remember from a couple weeks ago?”

“Actually,” Julie says, “how bout you start with the weirdest stuff first.”

Mike blinks at her, then shrugs, sets his hands on his thighs, and starts talking. Dutch heard him mention the monster dreams before, but this time Mike goes into a little more depth, describing how each set of dreams started and the highlights of what happened.

“—And then I got bit on the leg, and the poison moved pretty quick, and we didn’t have an antidote, s-so…” Mike’s eyes flicker from face to face and he licks his lips, looks down again. “So Jacob took off my leg.” He starts in again, talking faster. “So then we had to figure out how to—”

“Bro?” Chuck breaks in, hands pausing on his screen in the middle of taking notes. “That sucks, but—why are you nervous about it?”

Mike looks at him, startled. “I—I’m fine, dude.”

Dutch breathes in, puts a careful hand on Mike’s shoulder. “You gotta tell us if you just don’t wanna say, man. You do look kinda worried.”

Mike hesitates and looks around at them again. “I just—I know this one was a dream, okay? I had it figured out almost as soon as I woke up, I didn’t think—I _knew_ , okay?”

“Okay!” Chuck says. “Dude, we believe you!”

Mike looks back down at his hands. “You guys—in the dream you guys thought I deserved to lose the leg, because I shouldn’t have got myself bit in the first place. And, I mean, maybe I did,” he laughs a little and then flinches, wide-eyed, as Chuck, Dutch and Texas all jump in at once with variations on _No you didn’t!_

“You definitely didn’t,” Julie says firmly. “But what were you about to say?”

Mike takes a breath. “You—you guys told Jacob to take the leg off, and said I could just deal with it if it… hurt, and… if it killed me it wasn’t like it’d be a big loss.” He looks up from his hands to stare at them all. “I know it was a dream, okay, don’t—don’t be—I got this one.”

Julie has her knuckles pressed against her mouth like maybe she feels a little sick, like Dutch does.

“Oh my god,” Chuck says faintly.

“Dang, that’s super messed up!” Texas says. “That was totally the Evil Fake Ninja Burners, but we’re on to them now! Don’t worry, Tiny, we’ll track ‘em down! You don’t gotta worry about those jerks anymore.”

Mike relaxes slightly and smiles at Texas. “Thanks, big guy.”

Dutch blows out his breath. “Dang, man. That sucks.”

To his disbelief, Mike tips his head in an ambivalent gesture. “I mean, it wasn’t fun, yeah, but. I liked that continuity better than some of the others. Losing a leg made it real easy to tell if I was awake or not. Or… if I was in that continuity or not, at least.”

“Yeah, I bet,” Chuck mutters, typing again. Mike glances at him uncertainly.

“Okay,” Dutch says, steeling himself. “So what’s next on the weird list?”

Mike nods and starts talking again. He gets through various monsters and zombies, a series where a nasty plague killed everyone but Mike, and one where everyone but him also died, but of accidents and attacks instead of sickness. Reasonably normal nightmare fare, Dutch thinks, if they hadn’t seemed so real and if Mike hadn’t been trapped in them for weeks. The one where Kane had won and the Burners all blamed Mike for it seems just as plausibly nightmarish, but something bugs Dutch about it. It might just be the way Mike slides hurriedly over the mention that they beat him up before handing him over to Kane in exchange for their lives. Like he’s minimizing their crimes, standing up for them.

“Man,” Dutch says the instant he realizes, “you don’t have to make excuses for dream-Burners, okay? They’re jerks! They had no right betraying you, I don’t care what mistake you made!”

“I—I know it was a dream, okay, I know,” Mike says. It’s kind of disturbing the way he keeps dropping his eyes. “I know that.”

He’s so tense, and Dutch doesn’t know what to say to fix it. “Okay, man,” he says lamely. “That’s good.”

Mike keeps talking, slower as he gets to the one where he was the one who died and the Burners decided they liked it better without him. So when he came back to life they killed him again, except he kept coming back and they kept having to do it again and again, getting more angry with him each time.

“Holy _crap_ , bro,” Chuck says, one hand clenched in his hair in distress.

Dutch can’t think of anything to say but ‘that sucks’, and he doesn’t want to hear how Mike was actually okay with it because obviously he’s not dead here so it was easy to keep track. Instead he sets a hand on Mike’s back and just leaves it there. Mike gives him a sideways look, then smiles and relaxes a little. Dutch hates the way he keeps going hunched and uncertain, like he’s expecting them to get mad about his nightmares or something.

Mike’s in the middle of another standalone dream when Julie raises a thoughtful hand and cuts him off in the middle.

“That’s a running theme,” she says. “We were angry with you, blaming you for everything, turning against you—was it like that in every dream?”

“No, not—” Mike hesitates. “Not… I dunno. It didn’t happen all the time, but I don’t know how much of that’s a dream and what’s real. All this—I know everything so far was a dream.” He gives them a small smile. “Mutt’s not wrecked.”

Julie leans forward, folding her arms on the table. “But you still believed us—them, the dream Burners. They would say everything was your fault or that you deserved it—like the poisoned bite, they said it was your own fault and you agreed. You just told us so. You know that was a dream, but you still think if it had been real you would’ve deserved it.”

Mike shrugs, puzzled. “I mean, the little monster, yeah, I wasn’t fast enough. Wasn’t good enough. But, I mean, it _was_ a dream, it’s not like monsters are about to come out of the walls again, so it’s not a problem.” He looks around at them. “Right?”

“No,” Chuck says. “That’s—Mikey, you didn’t deserve that. You didn’t deserve _any_ of it, okay, they were lying to you! You—you get that now, right?”

Mike stares at Chuck a minute, then looks around at the rest of them. Dutch nods at him, encouraging.

Mike looks back at Chuck. “You can’t really know that, though, dude, you weren’t there,” he says reluctantly. “Besides, why does it matter when I know it’s a dream?”

Chuck gapes at him speechlessly for a second and Dutch steps in.

“Because obviously it messed with your head,” he says. “And if you’re thinkin’ in real life you deserve bad stuff because of what those dream-Burners said, that’s… that’s not right. You’re a pretty cool guy, you deserve good stuff. That make sense?” he adds, because Mike is staring at him like he just started talking binary.

Mike doesn’t answer, looking from him to Texas to Julie to Chuck. “You don’t… you can’t really think that, though,” Mike tells them. “I mean, I screw up all the time, I make things worse, I get on you guys’ nerves—”

“No you don’t!” Chuck bursts out.

“You really don’t,” Julie says. “You’re our leader, dude. It wouldn’t work if we didn’t like you a lot and think you’re good at leading.”

Mike looks at her and Chuck a minute, chewing on his lip. Dutch sees him slip a hand in his jacket pocket and hopes he’s not so freaked out that he’s touching the storage unit of his staff for reassurance, but there’s a papery rustle. His note, Mike's been carrying Dutch's note around all morning, and it makes something in his chest go warm and sad all at once. 

“You all—still?” Mike says. “I mean, after all this mess, you still think I’m…?”

“A good leader? _Yeah,_ Mikey,” Chuck says, and Dutch mentally thanks him for not saying something about _when you’re actually leading and not making_ me _do it_.

“Texas?” Mike says.

Texas looks startled. “Uh, yeah! Heck yeah, Tiny, Texas wouldn’t follow you if you weren’t real good at it, but you’re great!”

 _Texas wouldn’t follow you_ , Dutch thinks, keeping his amusement to himself, _if he didn’t kind of admire you a heck of a lot, and think you’re just about the best, and also definitely want to jump you just like the rest of us do_.

Mike drops his gaze. “Not so much, recently.”

“Well _yeah_ ,” Texas says, “nobody’s gonna be great at stuff while they’re all distracted fightin’ off evil ninja Burners and creepy monsters and junk, but that’s okay! You got time. ‘Specially now we got these ninjas on the run. _Ha-chaw!_ ”

Mike looks back up, smiling cautiously. “Yeah? You’re really okay with this, T-Texas?”

Texas frowns at him. “ _Yeah_ , dude. Uh. Hey. You gotta keep callin’ Texas ‘Tex’, okay? It’s weird if you don’t.”

“Yeah,” Julie puts in, “did dream-us tell you not to use nicknames or something? Because I don’t have a problem with ‘Jules’, you can go back to that.”

“You—really?” Mike says. “That’s okay?”

“Yeah, cowboy,” she says, a little pointedly.

He blinks at her, looking more lost than pleased. “Oh.” Glances around again. “Geez, this is just… so weird.”

“Bro, we like you, okay?” Chuck says. “No one’s angry, or thinks you’re irresponsible, or anything.”

Mike nods. “Right. Second chance,” he murmurs.

“What?” Dutch says.

Mike looks at him. “Because the nightmares were messing me up, you guys are giving me a second chance,” he says cautiously. “I gotta prove that I can be smart and responsible and pull my own weight,” he glances at Texas, “stop being an arrogant jerk. Y’know. That stuff.”

Chuck shoves both hands into his hair. “Oh my god, bro,” he says, voice cracking.

“Man, _no_ ,” Dutch says. “You’re still on your _first_ chance, okay? Just like the rest of us.”

“Chuck didn’t mean we’re not angry at you _anymore_ ,” Julie says. “He meant, we haven’t been angry to start with.” She sits back, frowning. “Maybe we haven’t been clear enough. It’s not that we’ve decided you can stay in the Burners, it’s that we never wanted you to quit, okay? We haven’t just decided to—to put up with you or something, we never had a problem with you in the _first_ place.”

Mike is staring at them all, confused with an edge of panic in it. “Never had a _problem_ ,” he says. “No, that’s—that can’t be right, you _all_ have problems with me! I mean, no, not have, you _had_. You were annoyed I was falling down on the job,” he says to Julie, “and Dutch, you were disappointed in me, wanted me to shape up and stop making things harder on everyone, and Chuck was just kind of,” his voice wavers, “sick of me in general. Wanted me to stop being overbearing and thoughtless and ignoring what other people wanted.”

Chuck is shaking his head, lip caught in his teeth in distress.

“And Texas—” Mike looks at Texas and stops, frowning. “The pushing around wasn’t real,” he says slowly, “and the wanting me to quit wasn’t real…” He glances around, double-checking, and everyone shakes their heads in dismayed agreement. “But you were pretty mad about the way I’ve been treating you,” he says to Texas. “I mean, I didn’t mean to be a jerk, but I’ve been making you feel bad, being full of myself and pushy and—”

“No you _haven’t!_ ” Texas explodes. “Tiny, none of that stuff is true! That was the fake jerk Burners, not us! Come on, you gotta get them out of your head, don’t let ‘em mess you up anymore!”

Mike stares at him, looks around again, eyes wide and shocked.

“He’s right,” Julie says. “I _haven’t_ been annoyed with you, and I’m not now.”

“And I’m not sick of you!” Chuck says, sounding upset enough that Julie pats his shoulder.

“And you haven’t disappointed me,” Dutch says, “and I don’t think you could.”

“And Texas _isn’t mad at you!_ Like I keep sayin’!” Texas crosses his arms.

Mike just sits there for a long moment looking stunned and bewildered. Finally he says, “But that’s like… everything I remember, practically.”

With an unpleasant twist in his gut, Dutch gets the full impact of what’s going on here. They’re asking Mike to give up believing in the most persuasive reality he’s got, in exchange for one without nearly as much supporting evidence. It’s more than two weeks’ worth of memories up against two days’ worth, plus his friends saying this is real. That’s… not the strongest case.

“We can help you sort out what really happened,” Julie says steadily. “I bet you do remember the real stuff, it’s just mixed into the dreams so you can’t tell the difference.”

Mike looks at her, searching her face. Dutch forces himself to keep breathing. Mike slowly nods, then sighs and scrubs his hands over his face.

“Okay,” he says. “Okay. No one is mad, because no one’s _been_ mad.” He looks up and nods firmly. “I got it, I believe you guys,” he says, and smiles, rolling his hunched shoulders back and down. He's still tense, and the caution in his eyes is still there, but he's doing a pretty good imitation of how he used to hold himself, how he used to look at them.

It _is_ an imitation, though. Dutch nibbles on his lip. Mike can't forget everything he's been dealing with and act like it never happened, no matter how much he wants to. Just like the guy to think he can power through this on will alone.

Julie and Chuck glance sideways at each other and Julie tilts her head at Mike. “It's probably going to take a while for it to really sink in, you know. For you to _know_ you're safe with us.”

“Which is _fine_ , that makes sense, bro,” Chuck adds.

Mike looks from him to Julie, frowning, then drops his eyes and scrubs his hands against his knees. “I'm gonna work on it, though,” he says stubbornly. “I'm gonna try really hard, I'll get over it faster than you think, I can _do_ it.”

“Take it easy, man,” Dutch says, patting his shoulder. “You're doin’ fine.”

“We'll _all_ be working on this, anyway,” Chuck says, shrugging, and jumps when Texas chimes in with “ _Yeah!_ We're gonna protect you, now we know what's goin’ on! Those evil bad-guy Burners don't stand a chance up against _Texas!_ Don't worry, Tiny, we'll prove you don’t gotta be scared now!”

Mike looks over at him and smiles. “Thanks, Tex.” He bites his lip and looks around at the rest of them, smile smaller but still real. “You guys have all been really good to me, the last couple days,” he says quietly. “Really patient and nice and… you’ve been great. So… thanks. I'm really lucky to have you guys.”

“Aw, Mikey,” Chuck says, voice breaking, and lunges sideways along the curved bench to wrap his arms around Mike, burying his face in Mike’s shoulder. Mike hugs him back, the startlement on his face shifting to pleasure.

“Hey,” Mike says, voice soft. “Everything’s fine now.”

Julie grins suddenly. “Nope, not quite yet,” she says, scooting along the bench herself, and kind of drapes herself against both of them, putting one arm around a startled Chuck and the other around Mike’s shoulders. She throws a grin Dutch’s way and he laughs and moves over flush against Mike to hug all three of them.

“Hey, no fair!” Texas says from behind Dutch, and then the breath goes out of Dutch with a _whoof_ as Texas yells, “ _Texas-style power hug!_ ” and launches himself bodily at them, curling around the bunch of them and nearly dragging them all onto the floor under the table.

“Texas!” Chuck yelps.

“Watch it!” says Julie.

Dutch grumbles at him, trying to get his balance back.

Mike bursts out laughing. “Take it easy, Tex. All that muscle’s kinda heavy, you know.”

“Aw, don’t worry, Tiny,” Texas says, shifting around to rebalance, then squeezing them all so Chuck squeaks. “Texas won’t go crushin’ anybody with his amazing muscularity.”

“Sure, okay, except me,” Dutch gasps, and Texas guiltily loosens his hold.

After a minute, Julie pulls back, and then Texas, and Dutch squeezes Mike and Chuck again before letting them go, grinning.

“You guys are great,” Mike says, as Chuck finally pulls away with a surreptitious sniffle. Mike’s grinning at them all, almost all the tension gone from his face and shoulders, his delight making it impossible not to grin back.

“Yeah, well,” Texas says, “you’re pretty great, too.”

“Agreed!” Julie says.

Chuck laughs a little and pretends not to be wiping his eyes under his bangs.

“Yeah,” Dutch says, clapping Mike on the back. “Man, it’s really good to see you lookin’ more yourself.”

“Y’know,” Mike says, “I like it too.” He leans into Dutch, who was just thinking he should maybe move back out of Mike’s space. Apparently not. He puts his arm around Mike and Mike kind of sighs and relaxes into him. Wow. Okay. Guy’s a little touch-starved, maybe—which makes sense, since for the last while he hasn’t been throwing his arm around people’s shoulders like he’s used to doing all the time. A couple of group hugs, however therapeutic, aren’t going to be enough.

It makes perfect sense, it’s just that Mike is kind of nestled into Dutch and if Dutch just turned his head and bent a little, his nose would be in Mike’s hair, which is still a little damp from his morning shower and smells really good and what Dutch is saying is, he’s kind of distracted.

Fortunately, no one seems to have noticed. “So… what now?” Mike says. “Where do we start?”

“I mean,” Chuck says, “really we should probably try chronological now, start from two weeks ago, but, uh, _I_ don’t really remember much from that far back, so I’m not sure how much good that’ll do us.”

“Why don’t you tell us what you can remember,” Julie suggests to Mike. “Starting with that run-in we had with the Terras.”

“Oh, yeah, good idea,” Mike says. “ _That_ , I remember!”

Dutch is doing his best to pay attention, really he is, but Mike has a cautious hand on Dutch’s back now and is practically cuddled against him and his mind keeps heading off in the wrong direction entirely. From the pieces he manages to pay attention to, it sounds like Mike’s memory of the first few days with the burr is patchy, reasonably enough, except for a couple of missions. He relates the missions and Julie and Chuck confirm them as real and Mike’s smile is so bright and pleased it hurts.

The rest of that week is less blurry, and Mike’s preoccupied more with stuff that didn’t happen than stuff that did. He describes the run-in with the Duke pretty accurately, as far as Dutch recalls of what that nutjob was up to, but then he gets quiet and has to be prompted to go on.

“The next bit… I think it was a dream, though,” he says, and he’s not calm and relaxed anymore, he’s gone tense against Dutch’s side.

“You’re telling us everything, just to be safe, remember?” says Julie.

Mike bites his lip, then shrugs awkwardly. “Texas was goin’ off on me on the way home, and then Chuck agreed with him,” he says, more quietly, eyes on the table.

“Goin’ off about _what?_ ” Texas says, bewildered. He’s leaning forward on the table to see Mike around Dutch.

Mike looks over at him. “How I was losing my edge, I was pathetic, you couldn’t believe you’d ever listened to me—just… that kind of stuff.”

“Geez, man,” Dutch murmurs, and moves his hand up from its careful place on Mike’s side to stroke his hair a time or two. Well, he means it to be just a time or two except that Mike’s eyes flutter closed and he sighs and sags into Dutch like that was the magic don’t-be-tense button, so okay. Dutch keeps stroking his hair and hopes the sheepish delight doesn’t show too much.

By the amused look Julie’s giving him, there’s not much chance of that. Great, he’ll only get teased about this for the next six months or so.

“Evil Nega Texas had better keep his mouth shut now, Tiny, that’s all I’m sayin’!” Texas says belligerently. “Nobody talks to Texas’s buddies like that! Especially not big, stupid lies like you bein’ pathetic! That’s just… real dumb!”

“I hate to agree with Texas,” Chuck says, “but I’d rather agree with this one than the nasty dream Texas. You’re fine, bro, nobody thinks that stuff.”

Mike smiles at him and Texas and tilts his head into Dutch’s hand. Dutch swallows and keeps patting.

Mike goes on describing what he remembers, and by the week just past he was living in a near-constant fog of nightmare elaborations around every single thing that actually did happen, twisting even his brief lucid periods into brutal, nerve-wracking trials he inevitably failed. The others do their best to set him straight calmly, sorting out truth from the whole gruesome mess of lies he’s been living with. Dutch is pretty sure he’s not imagining that Mike believes them easier and stays more relaxed when he’s got Dutch rubbing his back and ruffling his hair, which is definitely the only reason Dutch keeps it up. No matter what Chuck thinks as he bites back that little smirk.

Eventually Mike gets up to the day they found the burr on him and says, “And then Chuck said he wouldn’t ride with me anymore, but that was— that was a dream, right?” so confidently that everyone winces, and Mike freezes up in renewed horror.

“Chuck…?” he asks. “That was… but I thought… you guys were saying you weren’t really mad at me.”

“I—it wasn’t that I was mad,” Chuck says, unconvincingly, and squirms when Julie shoots him a look. “Okay, I _was_ , but it wasn’t like the rest of this stuff, it was because you wouldn’t _listen_ , and I was— I was really scared for you, bro. I was scared for like, all of us. You were so tired all the time, I just wanted you to _rest_ , but you _wouldn’t_ , and it— I was dumb, okay. I’m sorry!”

“You were right,” Mike says, and glances up like he still hopes they’ll contradict him on this one. Dutch hugs him harder, but… can’t. He nibbles on his lip, glancing from Mike’s uncertain look to the unhappiness on Chuck’s face, the way he’s huddled into himself, and has no clue what to say.

“It’s not like anyone was _happy_ to see you and Chuck on the outs,” Julie says, dark eyes flicking between the two of them like she’s making the same calculations as Dutch. She hesitates, gaze lingering on Chuck before going back to Mike. “But he… he kind of had a point. No one knew if you were gonna start falling asleep at the wheel. We couldn’t blame him for making that call.”

Chuck unfolds a little, looking cautiously relieved. Mike’s eyes are down again and he just nods silently. This sucks, he needs comfort too, but Dutch isn't sure what he needs to hear.

“Yeah, it’s like, mega weird when you two snuggle bunnies don’t have your whole hugs and sunshine routine goin’ on,” Texas says. “But Chuck’s a sharp guy when he pays attention, he makes pretty alright calls sometimes.”

Chuck looks completely floored by this approval. “I just… I wanted you to take your health seriously,” he says. “To take how bad things were seriously. But you took it the wrong way and then everything was awful. I just, I didn’t know, man.”

Mike nods again, looking miserable, and Dutch doesn’t know what to do, but he's gotta do _something_. He squeezes the back of Mike’s neck, trying to be reassuring, and his heart cracks a little when Mike looks up at him with this helpless, vulnerable confusion.

“You’re getting better, though,” Dutch points out. “I mean you look _way_ better today than even just yesterday. You rest up another day or two and Chuck won't have any problem riding with you again, right?” He glances at Chuck.

“No!” Chuck says, startling. “I mean! Yeah, _yes_ , Mikey, I’d love— I’d love to, I really want to, dude. You _know_ I want to.”

From his expression, Mike knows no such thing. He looks so relieved and grateful he could melt.

“I will,” he says. “I’ll get better now, I promise. I won’t let any of you down.”

“We know you won’t,” Dutch says, and gives him another reassuring squeeze. Mike shivers, eyes closing, and then leans his face into Dutch’s shoulder, tense like he thinks maybe Dutch will change his mind all of a sudden. Which, uh, no, _that’s_ not going to happen.

Man, Dutch is so glad his skin doesn't show a blush like Chuck's does.

“Okay,” Julie says. “We’re almost up to the present.”

“Yeah,” Dutch says, “after that you and me took off for that junk yard and you fought that thorn vine—” Mike winces. “And then we came back and Chuck found the burr while we were gettin’ you fixed up, and, like, no one said anything mean or did anything bad the whole time, okay?”

Mike lifts his head to look at Dutch for a second before nodding. “Got it.”

Dutch isn’t sure he wants to know, but he’s gotta ask. “Do you remember somethin’ different?”

Mike smiles, shrugs and drops his forehead against Dutch’s shoulder again. “Not important, it wasn’t real. You wouldn’t… you don’t do stuff like calling me a failure,” he says softly. "Sayin' you shoulda... left me back there."

Dutch grimaces a little, since Mike isn’t looking. Dutch is really, really glad they’re done with the dream recitation, this crap is getting him down. “You got that right, man. I'd never leave you anywhere!” He runs his hand up into Mike’s hair, strokes down the back of his neck and Mike lets out a quiet little sigh.

“Okay,” says Chuck, only slightly squeaky, “that’s it, then. We’re done, we got it all—bro, are you good, now? Clear what was real and what wasn’t?”

Mike looks up and nods.

“You can always ask if you’re not sure about something,” Julie says.

“Yeah, for sure,” Dutch agrees. “We wanna help you out with that.”

“Thanks,” Mike says, leaning into him. “I think I got it for now, though.”

“Cool,” Chuck says, smiling, and closes the screen he’s been taking notes on.

“Awesome,” Texas says. “So now what? Tiny, you goin’ back to bed?”

“Uh, no?” Mike says. “I’m not sleepy.”

“Oh, cool! Okay, you wanna come—” Texas stops abruptly, possibly because Dutch is giving him an alarmed look and possibly because he realized on his own that sparring with Mike is a terrible idea right now. “…Watch… a movie with Texas?” he finishes.

That’s actually a really good idea. Mike is still recovering, and if they don’t distract him he’s gonna start trying to do things and wear himself out.

Mike blinks at Texas, looking cautiously pleased. “Really? I—yeah, T-Tex, that’d be great!”

“Good,” Dutch says. “You should take it easy today. Just watch some movies and chill, okay?”

“Oh, but—I can still help with stuff,” Mike says, predictably. “You guys don’t have to do all the—”

“Mike!” Julie says, and he flinches a little, looks at her wide-eyed. “Come on, cowboy, no one’s saying you couldn’t do it, or that you want to skip out on your responsibilities or something. That stupid plant took a lot out of you, and we just want you to relax for a while so you’ll recover better. Okay?”

Mike nods hesitantly and Dutch’s heart aches.

“Nobody’s gonna think less of you, Mikey,” Chuck tries. “We just want you to be okay.”

Mike nods more firmly, and his smile at Chuck almost looks normal. “Okay,” he says. “You guys know I’m not that good at sitting around—”

“Oh, we know,” Dutch says.

“—But I’ll do my best.”

“We can maybe keep you company if you want,” Chuck says, a lot more cautious than he needs to be because—

“Yes!” Mike says. “I mean. If you guys want to, I know you’ve got stuff to do, especially if I’m not—”

“Yeah, man,” Dutch says, “we definitely want to. We like hangin’ out with you, remember? You’re our friend.”

Mike’s smile wobbles and his head thuds into Dutch’s shoulder, hiding his face again. God, Dutch is never going to get used to him being so… shy. So fragile and overwhelmed by the slightest kindness.

Dutch strokes his back and Mike takes a deep breath. “Okay,” he says, his voice catching briefly. “That—that’d be great, guys. I’d love it.”

“Good,” Julie says, and cocks her head to the side with a sly smile. “Operation: Everyone Watch A Movie With Texas is a go. Dutch, you transport the goods. Chuck, you get the fuel.”

“Fuel—? Oh! Haha, right!” Chuck climbs over the back of the booth, grinning, and heads for the kitchen. Dutch thinks for a second, then stands up and pulls Mike after him, hefting him up into a fireman’s carry.

“Goods secured for transport, ma’am!” he says smartly.

“Wh— hey!” Mike says, wiggling a little, but he’s laughing. “Guys!”

“What does Texas do?” Texas asks.

“Get the movie ready, duh,” Julie says. “Go, go, go!”

Texas jumps to his feet with a showy flip, then salutes her like a Weekend Warrior before dashing off.

“And what are _you_ doing?” Dutch asks.

“Bossing you knuckleheads around,” Julie says self-importantly, and strolls off to the rec room with her nose in the air.


	5. Chapter 5

Mike wishes he could stop questioning if this is real. He _knows_ it’s real, now, knows all that other stuff was nightmares, it makes _sense_ , it hangs together better than… than all his friends deciding at once that they’re tired of him. He’s got his continuity straight, he knows what’s going on. It’s just—this is _so nice_. It seems too good to be true.

Everyone’s packed onto the couch with Texas perched on the arm, doing his usual excited commentary, and Mike is so distracted by all the friendly contact that he has a hard time paying attention to the movie. Chuck is leaning against him on one side, Dutch has an arm over Mike’s shoulders on the other, and Julie keeps looking over to catch his eye and roll her eyes at Texas or just to smile at him.

It fills him with something light and soft and warm, makes him smile wide and amazed at his friends—too wide, he’s being pathetic, obvious, weird—but they don’t look at him like they think he’s a loser. They just smile back, bump shoulders, ruffle his hair.

When the movie’s over, Mike steels himself for them to leave, but Julie glances around and says, “How bout one more?”

“Sure!” Chuck says. “But this time someone besides Texas gets to pick.”

“Agreed,” Dutch says, and Mike grins helplessly as Texas huffs and folds his arms and makes a show of being annoyed.

Chuck gets up to put on whatever he’s picked out, and Julie gives Mike a thoughtful look.

“Mike, stand up a sec,” she says. Puzzled, he cooperates, and Julie looks at Texas. “Texas, come sit on the couch with us.”

Oh. That’s, there’s not really room for five people, so… huh. Mike’s stomach twists, and he hates that he can’t just shrug this stuff off anymore, it’s dumb. So Julie wants Texas on the couch, it’s not like she’s kicking Mike out of the room or anything. It’s not a big deal, he’s just being stupid.

Texas gives Julie a startled look, but comes and sits, Dutch scooting over to give him a space next to Julie. Well, Mike’s not going to push Chuck out of his spot, so he’ll just perch on the other arm of the couch, no problem. Even if that means he doesn’t get any more pats and hair ruffles and stuff. He’s fine, this is fine.

Chuck comes back and hesitates, seeing Mike on the arm, but Julie sighs and says, “Sit down!” and he does.

“Good!” Julie says. “Now, Chuck, kindly redistribute the goods. Everyone should get a fair portion.”

Chuck brightens up, snorting with laughter. He stands up again, hooks an arm under Mike’s knees and the other behind his back and picks him up effortlessly, then lays him down startled and stiff across everyone’s laps. Chuck sits down again with Mike’s boots resting in his lap.

Dutch pats Mike’s thigh, laughing. “Didn’t realize somebody was feeling shorted,” he says to Julie.

Julie smiles down at Mike and says primly, “Now we _all_ get to have some.”

He smiles back even though it’s unsteady, and turns his head as the movie starts, hoping that will make it less obvious that his vision is suddenly blurry. Julie doesn’t say anything, just strokes his hair and watches the movie.

“You know, Mikey,” Chuck murmurs after a few minutes, “these are real nice boots, but I’m stealing them now.” He starts working them off Mike’s feet.

“I like those boots,” Mike mumbles back under the noise of the movie, surreptitiously wiping his eyes.

“Yup, too bad,” Chuck says, sets them aside on the floor, and starts rubbing the sole of Mike’s foot.

The startled groan of pleasure Mike lets out is a lot louder than he meant it to be. He bites his lip and goes stiff again, because it’s reasonable for people to want quiet when they’re watching a movie, but all that happens is that Julie says, “Oh, good idea, Chuck,” and starts rubbing Mike’s scalp and oh, wow, yes, this is definitely okay. Mike’s not sure how he got to the place where he’s lying in his friends’ laps while they absently give him massages, but he’s not about to complain. He’s just going to sort of quietly melt and hope no one minds.

A minute later Texas looks away from the movie long enough to realize what’s going on and says to Chuck, “Little man, you been holdin’ out on Texas! Me next!”

“Nope,” Mike says blearily, sighing as Julie rubs at the base of his skull and Chuck digs thumbs into the ball of his foot. “I got here first, those hands are mine.” It takes a moment for the alarmed second thoughts to show up, because of course he’s kidding, but was that okay? What if Chuck’s offended? What if Texas is annoyed?

“Hah!” says Texas. “They don’t look like your hands, Tiny, they’re all freckly and junk!”

“And highly skilled, and not rubbing your feet any time soon, Texas,” Chuck puts in.

“It _is_ only fair,” Julie says, “to have to give some if you want to get some. Mike’s back could use some attention, if you turn him over.”

“Texas is on it!” Texas says, manhandles Mike over onto his stomach and digs his fingers in on either side of Mike’s spine. Mike groans and goes completely limp.

“Hey, hang on,” Dutch says. “I’m fine with givin’ some to get some, but what am I supposed to rub?”

“Oh,” Julie says in a dangerously innocent tone, “you don’t want to give Mike a—”

“Julie oh my god,” Chuck groans.

“Come on now,” Dutch says.

“Butt rub?” Julie chirps, and there’s a startled beat before everyone cracks up at once. Mike is snickering, face hot, trying not to think about Dutch rubbing his—anything around there, really. Not the time. Around his friends is never the time to think about that kind of stuff, even if sometimes it’s hard not to.

“Seriously, though,” Dutch says when he stops laughing.

“You don’t have to—” Mike starts, and Chuck says over top of him, “Calves! You can do his calves.”

“Oh yeah, that works,” Dutch says. He starts rubbing one calf, and okay, Mike’s done, he’s good, his brain is turning off now.

By the end of the movie, Mike is drifting in a hazy, blissful state, with all those hands idly patting him or still rubbing or just resting on him. Everything’s amazing. His friends are amazing. He feels amazing.

Chuck stretches and sighs. “All right, well, I gotta get some work—”

“Oh no you don’t,” Julie says. “What you _gotta_ is stay put and rub _my_ feet next.”

Mike blinks up at her, then back at Chuck. Chuck licks his lips and glances over at Dutch, cheeks going pink.

Dutch grins. “I’m up for a movie and massage marathon if you guys are. We already wasted half the day— let's blow the other half, too.”

“Heck yeah!” Texas says. “Texas can totally rub your butt for you, Julie!”

Julie gives Texas a level look. “Or you could stick with my back.”

“Or Texas could do that,” Texas says, disgruntled.

Mike groggily sits up to let Dutch get up and choose the next movie, realizes that leaves him sitting in Texas’s lap, and stands up, yawning. Julie gets up to give him her spot, wrestles off her boots and vest, and flops across all their laps when Dutch sits back down.

“You may begin,” she says grandly, and sighs in contentment as Chuck snorts and starts rubbing her feet.

Mike cautiously threads his fingers into the sleek weight of her hair and presses his fingertips against her scalp, suddenly _very_ awake. The happy sighing noises she’s making don’t stop, so he keeps going, trying to imitate what she was doing before, although she’s got a lot more hair to work around. He twists it into a sleek, heavy rope, revealing the slim pale lines of her neck and shoulders that are usually covered by her hair and vest collar. He touches her as gently as he can, worried about bruising her, but she only makes contented noises and pushes up into his hands, fearlessly enjoying herself. 

“Oh my god,” she mumbles after a few minutes, voice warm with contentment. “We’re idiots for not having done this before. We should do this all the time. Mike, you should have gotten traumatized earlier, this is amazing.” A second later her neck tenses up under his fingers, but he’s already sputtering out a startled laugh.

“You’re welcome, I guess,” he says, grinning, and she relaxes again.

“Mm, yeah, good work, cowboy,” she says. “Top marks, superior recovery techniques.”

Mike laughs again, glancing over at the others. Texas’s cheekbones are kind of flushed, eyes on the action onscreen as his hands move on Julie’s back. Dutch grins back at Mike, rolling his eyes. Chuck smiles absently, distracted by the movie, hands working on their own— wow, she’s got really small feet. No wonder she wears such big boots. That’s Julie all over, though, Mike figures, so big and sharp and poised a guy doesn’t notice her actual size until she’s… in his lap, half-stripped, her whole head resting in one of his hands, as relaxed as though nothing could hurt her.

Well, with this many boys curled around her, probably nothing actually could, short of an atom bomb. But Mike pets her hair extra carefully, and shares intermittent guilty smiles with his friends, like they’re all getting away with something.

Mike’s very careful to not think too hard about what, though. They’re his friends, and he’s so, so, _so_ lucky for that. He’s not going to ruin anything with extra, totally inappropriate thoughts, when he’s already got everything he wants handed back to him like he could somehow be worth it. He watches the movie instead, feeling warm and increasingly dozy in between remembering to pet Julie, and when Dutch picks the next movie out and Texas belly-flops over the rest of them, it feels like the most natural thing in the world to take his hat off and bury his fingers in Texas’s hair, ruffling up the slicked-back ’do, then trail his hands down and knead the thick, bunching muscles from his neck to his heavy shoulders. He's about as different from Julie as a guy could get, but seems to enjoy Mike's touch exactly as much.

“ _Oh, man, Tiny, you’re good at that,”_ Texas mumbles, and presses his face happily into the crease between Mike’s hip and thigh. Mike swallows hard, shifting carefully, and digs his thumbs into Texas’s warm skin. Everyone knows Texas is really, _really_ built, Texas makes darn sure of that, but it’s different with Texas right up in his space, jumpsuit stripped down and knotted around his waist, a strap of his tank top sliding down one bulky shoulder and all that sculpted muscle just laid out for Mike to touch. From the last couple weeks— from his _nightmares_ — he knows just how dangerous Texas can be, if he wants to, how hard he hits. But he’s not like that at all, right now, there’s no hint of coiled power in the thick, heavy arms he’s flopped over and around Mike, no sign of vicious temper or simmering resentment, he’s just… nice.

Mike’s hands exploring down his back meet Dutch’s hands going up, and Mike glances up, grinning kind of stupidly. Dutch just looks amused before he goes back to tracing the curve of Texas’s spine a lot more clinically than Mike thinks he could, apparently counting the vertebrae.

“You should draw this dude sometime,” Mike says. “It’d look good.”

“‘S’what’m _’sayin’_ ,” Texas mumbles, and nuzzles Mike’s hip emphatically, rucking up his shirt. Mike jumps a little, then laughs, embarrassed.

“Shh, the good part’s starting,” Julie says, of the movie, and pats Texas’s butt sharply. This time Texas jumps.

“‘S th’good part involve Texas’s butt?” he asks hopefully.

“More like the nightmare part,” Chuck says, and smirks when Texas pouts. Then he does something that makes Texas’s toes all crack at once, and the guy himself squeak like a stomped rat, and Chuck looks triumphant.

“No, _this_ is the good part, for sure,” Texas says emphatically, peering back over his shoulder, then back up at Mike. “Hey, pet my head some more, little guy. Texas needs more lovin’ up top.”

Dutch pulls a _seriously?_   face at Mike, who just shrugs and does as he’s told.

When that movie is over, Mike’s stomach is curling in on itself with hunger, and according to the growling coming from Texas’s midsection he’s not the only one. Since Chuck made the initial snack run, Julie delegates Dutch and Texas to go for more supplies, and Mike takes the opportunity to slip off to the bathroom. He just needs a minute alone to get hold of hims—jeez, get _control_ of himself. And… maybe that other thing, too.

Because when the door is shut behind him, he can’t stop feeling the warm density of Texas’s muscles, the give and flex of them under his hands. The delicate curve of Julie’s back as she lay in their laps, the smooth weight of her hair around his fingers, the little contented sighs she made, the deeper noises Texas let out, they’re all coming back to him at once, pulling heat up through him like he hasn’t felt in days, weeks.

He gives in. Opens his pants, grabs, strokes.

He can’t think about them being with him because they don’t want that and he probably wouldn’t deserve it if they did, and anyway it’d be ungrateful to want more than he’s already got. Instead he thinks about Julie perched in Texas’s lap, small hands wrapped in his black hair as she kisses him. Thinks about the muscles in Texas’s back rippling as he picks her up, pulls her closer, both of them flushed and breathless from kissing.

In his imagination Julie arches her back, makes a soft noise against Texas’s lips and Texas hums down in his chest, curves his hand around the back of her neck under her hair. She pulls off her vest, her hair swinging with her movement, and Texas’s jumpsuit is around his hips already and he strips off his tank top. God, they’re so gorgeous.

It’s been a while since Mike had any alone time of this particular kind— he's been so _tired_ , so sick and scared—and it feels so good now that he kind of wants to make it last, but that isn’t happening. The images of Texas and Julie, and the flickers of Dutch and Chuck that slide in there before the end, push him straight to the edge and over it.

He leans against the wall, panting, until his knees stop trying to give and he can control the dumb grin. Wow, it’s nice to be rested and relaxed and—everything—enough to do that again. Although… he’s going to have to be careful, now. Especially when his friends are all being so kind and understanding and great—Mike doesn’t want to do anything to mess that up. He can’t get weird or act different, can’t jeopardize what he’s so lucky to have in the first place.

A little sobered but still gently buzzing from the climax, he cleans up, washes his hands, and opens the bathroom door—

Texas is standing there, arms crossed, frowning at him, and all Mike can think is that he _knows_ , somehow, Mike must have made some kind of noises or something and Texas heard and he’s going to be so angry, so disgusted, it hasn’t even been a day and Mike’s already blown it and he knows that look in Texas’s eyes, that dark hard look just before things get ugly— before Mike gets what he deserves—

Texas catches the door as Mike backs up, almost tripping over his own heels.

“Tiny,” Texas says, scowling, pressing closer, further in. “You can’t just go off on your own like that, little guy!”

“Okay,” Mike says reflexively. “Sure, sorry! Whatever you say!”

The bathroom’s really, really small with Texas crowding him like this, and Mike presses hastily up against the edge of the sink when Texas comes even closer, hands rising to ward off— he’s not even sure what—

“—Hey, hey! Mike, it’s okay, it’s me,” Texas is saying, eyes wide, deep voice gone weirdly hoarse. “Chill, bro, I got you, it’s the good guy Texas, he ain’t gonna do _nothin’_.”

“I’m sorry,” Mike repeats, “I won’t do it again, I promise, I’m sorry—”

“Hey, hey, no,” Texas says, and grabs him. Mike flinches all over but the pain doesn’t come yet, he's pinned but Texas isn't hurting him, just holding him still, heavy arms wrapped around him—

...Hugging him.

He’s an idiot.

He buries his face in Texas’s shoulder and hugs back, tightly. Still breathing fast, he's shaking a little, feeling like the world’s dumbest, saddest, worst excuse for a friend ever.

“I’m sorry,” he says again. “I’m really, _really_ sorry.”

“Don’t beat yourself up, Mike!” Texas says fiercely. “No one’s allowed to do _that_ anymore, not even you!”

Mike laughs at that, though it comes out kind of squashed and pathetic.

Texas rubs his back and says, a lot more softly than Mike would ever have thought the guy could manage, “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t go off on your own right now, it’s not safe. Like what if the Evil Nega jerks come back and you’re alone?” He hesitates. “Did they? They did, didn’t they? I was _tryin’a_ look out for ‘em!”

Mike pulls back enough to give Texas the steadiest smile he can manage. “No, Tex, it’s okay, they weren’t here. It’s fine, we’re cool.”

Texas gives him a look of deep skepticism. “Yeah, really, cuz it _kinda maybe_ looked to _me_ like you thought I was that other guy, the _totally not cool at all in like any way EVER_ Texas. You wanna try pullin’ another fast one on me or are you good for the night?”

Mike winces in on himself. “I didn’t mean it like that! I just— I don’t— I know you’re the good guy, okay! I didn’t mean it like you’re dumb!”

“Darn straight,” Texas nods. “Texas got a brain just as jacked as his butt!”

“Texas! Jeez!” But Mike’s already laughing.

Texas, grinning triumphantly, smacks said butt and goes, “Wha- _cha!_ Nega-Tex got _nothin_ on all this! _”_

Mike hesitates before saying cautiously, “You know he’s… uh… not real, right? He was only in my nightmares, in my head.”

“ _Ch'yeah_ , Tiny, Texas knows that,” Texas says impatiently, then pats Mike’s back, hooks a careful arm over his shoulders. “But nightmares are _plenty_ real when you’re _havin’_ them, and it looks like they ain’t quite been chased off yet. So, you gotta get a load’a _Real_ Texas in your head instead!”

Mike goes a little blank for a moment, considering that he just _had_ Texas in his head, all _kinds_ of thoughts about Texas, but not at all the kind Texas is talking about. His cheeks heat, but fortunately Real, Not Evil And Also Not Stripping Texas doesn’t seem to notice.

“That way Real Texas can run down Evil Dumb Texas and those guys and kick their butts!” he finishes.

Mike opens his mouth to say that he doesn’t think it works that way, then changes his mind. “Yeah, okay, I’ll work on that, Tex,” he says.

“Good!” Texas says, and gives him an intent look. Mike tries not to shrink back under it, because obviously Texas isn’t mad right now, everything’s fine, but he can't help going a little tense.

Texas’s mouth pulls down at one corner. “Still don’t look so great,” he mutters, and then brightens. “But Texas can fix you up!”

Stepping back from Mike, he points both thumbs at himself and says, “Dr. Texas is prescribing you a double dose of _these guns!_ ” Crooning “Ka _-_ chaaaaw,” he flexes his arms, changes the pose, flexes again.

His jumpsuit is still tied around his waist, so his arms are bare and there’s a better view of his chest muscles than usual through his tank and it’s kind of a lot to deal with even after the butt joke. Mike’s face warms even as he laughs at Texas’s clowning.

“Yeah!” Texas says. “That’s lookin’ better, Tiny, keep that up. We gotta keep this good vibe goin’!” Putting his arm around Mike’s shoulders again, he herds him back off to the couch. 

“Oh good, hey,” Dutch says, smiling at Mike as they come in. “Everything all right?”

Mike smiles back and shrugs. “Yeah, fine.”

“Good work, Tex,” Julie says, and Mike blinks from her to the others, startled. He has to take a moment for it to sink in.

Texas’s ideas generally seem ridiculous to everyone else, and Mike assumed that coming to check up on him was no different. Julie approves, though. And Dutch is glad they’re back, and Chuck’s smile looks distinctly relieved.

They’re all being so careful with him. Mike’s chest is warm and tight as he sits down beside Dutch, and Texas perches on the arm of the couch beside him.

“Eat up,” Dutch says, and abruptly Mike is deluged with snacks. Laughing, he fends off a bag of chips to the face.

From the looks of it, Dutch and Texas brought back half the contents of Jacob’s kitchen. Mike starts working through his own pile of food as Chuck puts on the next movie and everyone else keeps munching.

Mike is kinda dozy all over again by the time he’s full and everyone’s finished eating. They’ve been watching movies for a while, like all day, he realizes, and they’re not even done yet. They can’t stop now, it wouldn’t be fair to Dutch and Chuck. He should probably feel guilty about not doing any of the stuff he had to do today, but hanging out with everybody has been so great, he can’t really worry about it.

“Well,” Julie says, “who’s next?” She looks expectantly from Dutch to Chuck.

“Not me,” says Dutch. “Half the movie’s over already! I want the full royal treatment.”

“Oh yeah,” Mike says. “That’s not really fair. Should we—uh…” He hesitates, unsure if he has the right to make suggestions.

“No, this is fine!” Chuck says hastily. “Dutch can have a movie and a half, that’s not a problem. I don’t really need a turn, so we can—”

There’s an immediate chorus of disagreement.

“Aw, man, no,” Dutch says.

“Boo!” Julie says. “No skipping allowed!”

“Everybody’s gotta get some love,” Texas says firmly. “Texas don’t skimp on his love handouts.”

“Come on, dude,” Mike says, smiling at Chuck. “We can, like, watch a couple cartoons after this so you get your fair share.”

Chuck hesitates, then slumps with a sigh. “Fine, I’ll—we can do this, but half a movie is _fine_ , okay, I don’t need more than that.”

“Fair enough,” Dutch says, shrugging.

“All right,” Mike says with a grin, “so get over here!” Then he freezes a little because what if that was too much, what if Chuck doesn’t like Mike telling him what to do—

Chuck smiles, ducks his head and laughs a little. “Okay, jeez,” he says, standing up, and Texas strides over to take his spot between Dutch and Julie. Cautiously, Chuck lies down across everyone’s laps, his body tense and uncertain.

“Um. Like—is this okay?” he asks.

“Yup!” says Julie, patting his legs.

“Yeah, it’s fine—dude,” Mike finishes awkwardly, and hopes no one notices.

Chuck’s shoulders hunch a little. “Mikey,” he says, so quietly Mike almost misses it under the noise of the movie, “you can use my nickname too, you know.”

“Oh,” Mike says, and digs his fingers into those hunched shoulders, because if Chuck’s going to make him feel all warm and happy, the least Mike can do is return the favor. Chuck makes a strangled kind of noise and goes limp.

“Whoa,” Mike says, rubbing a little more gently in case. “You okay?”

“ _Nnghmmohmygod_ ,” Chuck mumbles, and Mike laughs and relaxes. Chuck’s got more muscle than Julie, but less than Texas, and he’s way taller than either of them— it’s interesting. Mike was already used to hanging around with him, before all this nightmare stuff happened, and putting an arm around his friend whenever he felt like it. Feeling familiar with his size and shape, comfortable. But this is different, taking his time to map out the tight lines of his long neck, the span of his bony shoulders. The breathless, noisy way he whimpers when Mike presses his fingers into the mess of knots between his shoulderblades. They’re uneven, too, twisted more tightly on one side than the other, and Mike realizes it’s from his slingshot, the recoil’s been messing him up and he’s never _said_ , that’s Chuck all over.

“You need to stand up straighter, Chuckles,” Mike says, “take better care of yourself,” and his voice comes out kind of raspy, low and breathless. Chuck shivers under his hands, makes another high shaky noise.

“Okay,” he says. “Aaah, _sure_ , don’t stop doing that.”

Mike swallows kind of hard. He’s suddenly really, _really_ glad he took the chance to have some private time before now, or things could get—pretty horrible for everyone. As it is he just does his best to keep breathing steadily, and focus on chasing each twist and knot of tension out of Chuck’s back. The dude really _does_ need to have better posture, he’s a mess— when Mike works his way up to the long slope of his neck, Chuck’s noises get low and blissful, and Mike finds himself smiling. It feels good to make a guy he likes so much feel good.

“There we go, buddy,” he says, finishing up at the base of Chuck’s skull, and ruffles his shaggy hair. Then he bites his lip when Chuck makes an unhappy noise, everything crashing on him fast. That was too much, he shouldn’t have teased— shouldn’t have presumed—

“More,” Chuck mumbles, foggily, and nudges Mike’s hand with his face. “Don’t, nnh. Don’t be done.”

Mike’s ears are hot. “Sure, whatever you say,” he says, as lightly as he can, and starts all over again. Chuck makes softer noises now, relaxed and appreciative, and he’s so _responsive_ , like he’s always been, like he doesn’t have a mute button, and squirms under Mike's hands when Mike finds a particularly good spot.

Dutch takes a sharp, sudden breath in, and Chuck freezes. Mike looks at Dutch, worried he might have gotten kneed somewhere or something, and for a minute his eyes are wide and his mouth is open, and he takes a deeper breath, and shifts Chuck’s weight on his lap. Chuck shivers, and makes a cracked little noise that Mike’s never heard before— apologetic? Upset? Cranky?— but then Dutch shrugs, exaggeratedly, and turns back to the cartoon they’ve put on after the last movie.

“I love this show,” he says, his voice very casual, even though Mike’s listening hard for some kind of clue as to what’s going on. “Chuck, don’t you think it’s a good show?”

“Wh—aah, I, uh,” Chuck goes, shifting his weight again, “y-yeah? _Dutch!_ ” and now Julie’s staring at Dutch too, her eyes narrow. Dutch keeps watching the screen, but one of his long hands strokes along Chuck’s spine, settling him back down.

“Yeah, I thought so,” he says. “Keep going, Mike, it’s all cool.”

Julie snorts, shaking her head. “Well as long as everyone’s enjoying themselves,” she says dryly, and Dutch grins at her. Mike relaxes, bit by bit, as everyone settles in again. No one’s angry.

And Dutch is right, this is a pretty good show— some old classic about sewer mutants that fight to protect Ancient New York. The Burners absently argue over which of them would be who, and whether or not it’s a historical documentary. Chuck melts under Mike’s hands and Mike shifts slowly from rubbing his back to just… petting him, kind of, tracing his freckles, enjoying the warmth of his skin and the softness of his hair and his shivery, incoherent enjoyment. He shifts, sometimes, hitches around, shivers and resettles himself, and Dutch helps Mike hold him still, which is… kind of its own thing not to think about, Mike figures.

Finally the cartoon’s over and there’s a long, sleepy pause. Texas is actually all the way asleep, slouched way down with his head on Julie’s thin shoulder, snoring. Julie’s got an arm around him, looking nearly as dozy, running her nails through his hair. It’s incredibly cute, and when Mike nudges Dutch and indicates this with the tilt of his head, Dutch’s smile is wide and incredulous.

“Too bad Texas is such a bonehead,” Dutch murmurs. “He could actually get somewhere sometime.”

“He’s not that bad,” Mike says, automatically.

“With girls? Yeah, Mike, he’s _that bad_.”

Mike sighs, shaking his head. “He’s just growing up. We all are.”

Dutch gives him a different smile, softer. Warmer, like he’s proud of Mike, like he’s really happy for him, and it makes his heart race.

“Guess so,” is all Dutch says, though. Then, “…Hey, we should probably take another bio break before the last movie. Right?”

Mike kind of doesn’t want to move. Chuck’s warm and heavy across his legs, Dutch a long reassuring pressure against his side, and Julie and Texas are… are there. But they owe Dutch some attention, so.

“Right,” Mike says, and stretches his arms up, arching against the back of the couch to pop his back. He tugs a handful of Chuck’s hair, shakes him gently.

“Hey buddy, up and at ‘em,” he says.

“I’m up, I’m up,” Chuck mumbles, and shifts around a bit. He makes a hoarse, half-swallowed moan, and Dutch grabs for his hips, snickering.

“Yeah, you’re really up alright,” he says, and Chuck blushes, shifting around again, like he’s not sure how to get off—get _up_ — from the couch.

“Here, I’m gonna—” Dutch says, and pushes to his feet in one smooth burst of ridiculously long limbs. Chuck ends up kind of pushed over in his wake, squawking, and stumbles to his own feet with Dutch’s arm around his shoulders. Dutch leans in and murmurs something in his ear that makes him hunch up, arms wrapping around himself, but then he nods.

“Be right back,” Dutch says. “Mike, grab some more snacks or something.”

“Uh— you got it,” Mike says. Dutch salutes him with Mike’s own gesture, two fingers and a wry smile, and pushes Chuck out of the room ahead of him.

They can’t… they can’t be going to… to take their own personal time? Can they? No way. Mike’s gotta just be imagining it because he’s a total weirdo. No _way_.

*

Dutch kisses Chuck the second the bathroom door closes behind them. He can’t help it, he’s just spent an hour with the guy grinding against his lap, with those _noises_ , watching the endlessly sweet way Mike touched him, looked at him— and looked at Dutch, like he was happy to be sharing, like he thought it was just fine for Dutch to have his hands all over Mike’s best friend in the world, melting him down into an incoherent, horny mess.

Chuck kisses back just as desperately. They’ve never done this before but from the way Chuck opens his mouth for Dutch, sucks on his tongue, it feels like Chuck’s thought about it plenty. The guy’s big, broad hands cup Dutch’s hips, pull him close in just the right way, and even though Dutch has maybe thought it about it sometimes too, it’s a real trip to be pressed up against someone so close to his own height.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Chuck hisses, and starts working the clasp of Dutch’s pants open. Dutch laughs into his mouth, maybe a little hysterically, then moans when Chuck grabs his dick.

“Dude,” he goes, “oh, man, wow, that’s—you don’t have to—”

“Yeah,” Chuck says, “shut up, I had— _an hour_ , Gordy, _a fucking hour of— rrRGH!”_ He shoves Dutch up against the sink and then drops to his knees, fits his lips to the head of Dutch’s dick in a smooth, practiced move, and oh. Oh wow.

 _I am going to remember this forever_ , Dutch thinks. Tennie’s playful when she does this, teasing, and she’s all... compact strength, small and tough, clever little hands. Chuck is _big_ , almost as tall as Dutch and a lot broader, wiry muscle bunching in his arms as he keeps Dutch right where he wants him. And he doesn’t bother to tease, like _at all_. He works his mouth down Dutch’s length just as intently as he does everything, getting it _done_ , fast and brilliant and oh god that’s his throat, that’s his _fucking throat_ , Chuck knows how to deepthroat a guy, holy fuck.

It doesn’t take more than a minute before Dutch comes with a muffled groan, hand clapped over his mouth to keep from screaming. Chuck stays on him, swallowing over and over all around him, and when Dutch finally moans and pushes him off Chuck rolls back on his heels easily and _licks his lips_ , god. He grins up at Dutch with his mouth all wet and dark pink, like he’s cracked some top of the line encryption instead of just blown Dutch’s mind, which couldn’t have been anywhere near that hard.

“How’d you learn to _do_ that,” Dutch gasps, and Chuck’s smile gets a little broader.

“Around,” he says, and brushes his bangs back for a second, looking Dutch up and down. He doesn’t seem shy at all, now, just triumphant.

“C’mere,” Dutch demands, making grabby hands. Chuck snorts a laugh and gets to his feet, one of his hands cupping the tent in his jeans, adjusting it, and Dutch swats that hand aside and goes for it, even as he’s pushing Chuck against the wall so he can kiss the hell out of him.

It’s better this time around, a little less frantic on Dutch’s side and less vengeful on Chuck’s. Dutch gets his hand into Chuck’s pants and squeezes his dick through the soft, worn fabric of his briefs, feels his own tired dick twitch when he feels the wet spot. Chuck tips his head back against the wall and moans, a full-throated hungry noise like he’d been making when Mike had been working over his shoulders, and Dutch claps his spare hand over Chuck’s mouth, heart racing. Because, Mike. Because maybe they don’t wanna let on this is happening, like this, right now, with Chuck screaming his damn head off for Dutch, even though— a lot of Dutch really does want that, especially his dick, which shouldn’t get a vote.

“I love how you sound, man, but _cool it_ ,” he whispers. Chuck nods, his eyes hazy and heavy-lidded behind his messy bangs, and leans into Dutch’s palm when Dutch goes to remove it. Well, okay. Dutch keeps it there, and Chuck’s eyelids fall all the way closed. His shoulders slump in some kind of relief— relaxation? trust?— and Dutch can feel the warm damp heat of every muffled whimper when Chuck rolls his hips.

“I got you,” Dutch says. “Man, you’re hot like this. I wanna take you apart. I wanna fuckin’— _diagram you_ , dude.”

Chuck whimpers again, shuddering against both his hands, and moves his hips a lot more urgently. Dutch takes pity on the guy and brings his hand up from his dick, spits in his palm and shoves it back down, goes for skin-on-skin contact. God, Chuck’s been dripping this whole time, it feels like, everything down there’s practically slick enough already, and it’s easy to pump him in a smooth counterpoint to the urgent roll of his hips. Dutch leans back, arm’s length, and just looks at the guy, his raw desperation: his skin too pale to hide a flush, his self-control too thin to hide his pleading moans.

“I wanna mark you up,” Dutch says, breathless. “Your skin— dude, your skin’s so bright, I could— let me, I wanna try—”

Chuck’s eyes come open and it’s hard to read his expression, especially with his mouth covered, his eyes are just hot and bright, blow-torch blue. He shakes his head, though, after a long moment, and Dutch frowns, takes his hand away from his mouth.

“Nn _hah,_ ” Chuck goes, then, “Not, ah, ahaha- _aah, nnh, not wh-where… not…”_ he shudders, hips still pumping his dick back and forth in Dutch’s grip, mind pretty clearly elsewhere.

“Not where anyone can see?” Dutch guesses, and Chuck nods, eyes falling shut again. His mouth is still _so_ red, his thin lips flushed and maybe a little thicker than usual, swollen. From sucking Dutch’s dick, from getting kissed. Dutch leans in again to kiss him again, bites gently.

“I got you,” he says again. “I do this with Tennie, y’know. Mark her up everywhere her clothes cover. Paint myself into her with my mouth. Under her shirt. Her thighs… you’re so pale, dude, I know you bruise up _gorgeous_ —”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Chuck groans, “fuck, o-oh, yes, yeah, god, _Dutch_.”

“Yeah?”

“ _Fuck you! Yeah_ , aa-aa _ah,_ ” Chuck says, and claps one of his own hands over his mouth, stifling another really gorgeous series of whimpers.

“Alright then,” Dutch grins, and starts with the tender spot just under one of his ears, brushing his hair aside to find the hot flutter of his pulse right under the thin skin. He pulls back every now and then to check his work, watching the skin go pink and then red and then a broken maroon, all the delicate little capillaries bursting under suction, spreading out under that crazy pale translucence.

Chuck’s trying to thrust into his hand faster now but Dutch doesn’t want it over yet, loosens his grip. Grabs the sharp, bony angle of his hip with his other hand, keeps him steady. Chuck mumbles something unflattering and probably insincere, but lets him.

Dutch skews the high collar of Chuck’s shirt aside next, works the second mark right into the corner of his collarbone and jumping, twitching trapezius, then bites the whole muscle just to hear Chuck squeak and, laughing, pushes his shirt all the way up to get at one of his nipples next. He takes his time with one, sucking on it good and slow while teasing the other with his fingers, pinching and rolling it. Chuck doesn’t go nuts for this like Tennie does— it figures guys would be less sensitive, there’s a lot less to work with— but he sure as hell doesn’t _mind_ , and by the time Dutch is done they’re both dark and puffy and damn fine to look at.

A knock on the door gives both of them a heart attack.

“You guys about finished in there?” Julie says. “Or should I tell the other guys you went to bed early?”

Chuck looks like his brain kind of crashed and rolled, his face totally blank with panic.

“I could be about done,” Dutch says, and his voice is pretty close to level. “Chuck’s having a rougher time, he probably had too much junk food.”

“Yeah, I bet he had too much _junk_ ,” Julie says, and Dutch leans his forehead against Chuck’s shoulder and giggles.

“You’re not funny,” Chuck calls, his voice— wow, his voice all cracked and rough, stressed in a really excellent new way. He could sound like this forever as far as Dutch is concerned.

“I keep myself entertained,” Julie says, after a long pause. “Dutch, can we take a raincheck on your backrub? If you’re not out in like, two seconds, I don’t think we can keep this momentum going, Texas is pretty much out cold.”

“How’s Mike?” Dutch asks.

“Suspicious,” Julie says.

Chuck makes a hoarse little giggle, and thumps his head back against the wall. “ _Fuck_ ,” he says.

Dutch has a moment of intense dilemma. On one hand, he’s now the only guy who hasn’t gotten felt up by everyone for a couple hours and that really sucks. On the _other_ hand, he’s got Chuck’s dick in his hand and his own dick is starting to rally for some more attention and there’s no way either of them are getting out of this room in _two seconds_ and also Chuck knows how to deepthroat a guy and might do that for him again and _what if they went to bed_. What if they _actually went to bed_.

“…Can you make our apologies?” Dutch says. “I think, uh, maybe I… had too much junk to handle, too.”

“ _Handle_ ,” Julie says. “Uh- _huh_. Yeah, okay, have fun with that, boys.”

“And you all owe me _ten_ backrubs!” Dutch adds hastily. “Like, tomorrow or something!”

“We’ll negotiate terms later,” Julie says, which is not great to hear, but then she’s gone and Chuck’s still moving restlessly against Dutch and, uh, he’s just gonna have to deal with this.

“Wanna go to bed?” Dutch asks. “I mean. If we’re doing this. We could do it proper.”

Chuck looks at him, and their faces are… really close, and Chuck’s smile is _really_ nice. Dutch knows exactly why Mike likes him so much.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, okay, you’re on.”


	6. Chapter 6

Mike wakes with a gasping moan and flails for a minute, trying to sit up. There’s a weight on his chest and it’s hard to shift and he doesn’t remember where he went to sleep or what’s real—

The heavy thing moves, mumbles, “Mm, Mike? ‘S going on?”

Oh. Julie is sprawled half over him, was sleeping that way, apparently. Mike rubs his eyes clear of sleep grit and lifts his head to look around, heart still pounding from that nasty dream. He and Julie are sharing the couch and Texas is fast asleep on the floor.

Okay, that’s right, they fell asleep during the last movie, after Dutch and Chuck went to b—turned in for the night. This is real, it lines up. Okay.

“‘S okay,” Mike says hoarsely. “Just a dream.” Weird how it still shakes him even though he’s certain, this time he _knows_ it wasn't real. It was still kind of horrible.

Julie lifts her head off his chest and blinks sleepily at him and Mike’s heart does this weird flopping thing against his ribs. Her hair is all over the place, wow.

She frowns, blinks again and pulls herself off him, sits up, pushing her hair back over her shoulders. “You okay?”

Mike shoves himself upright and scrubs his hands over his face. “Yeah,” he mutters. Dang it, he feels all hollow and shaky in the middle. Waking up like this blows.

“Hm,” Julie says, and reaches up to put an arm over his shoulders. Mike looks over at her, startled. She isn’t usually much for touching.

“Wanna tell me about it?” she offers.

“Ahh, it was dumb.”

“Dreams usually are, once you’re awake.” She settles herself closer against his side, which—is really nice. “Still helps to talk about it sometimes.”

Mike blows out a long breath. “Kane was turnin’ people into mutant rats, and people didn’t realize and they were killing ‘em, and he turned you guys, and people were trying to—catch you, kill you, and I was tryin’ to protect you, but you all kept biting me and, like, wriggling away, and… it sucked.” God, that sounds so stupid. “I said it was dumb,” he adds.

“Ugh,” Julie says, “it sounds really nasty,” and wraps both arms around him in a firm hug. Geez, maybe Julie’s don’t-touch protocols take a while to come online in the morning?

“Well, I’m awake now,” Mike says, and dares to rest his cheek against the top of her head. She sort of… burrows her face into his neck, which feels a lot nicer than he’d have expected it to.

“Yeah, you’re back with us,” she says. She hasn’t really un-hugged, and Mike doesn’t want her to, so he cautiously hugs her back, wrapping first one arm and then the other around her narrow shoulders. It feels kind of incredible that someone so bright and important could take up so little space, could fit against him with so much room to spare. It makes him think of how small the rats were, when he was trying to catch them.

“Claire used to hug me and stuff after nightmares,” Julie says. “When we were still having real sleepovers. We’d share a bed. It’s nice just to like, hold someone, when you’re scared. But then I started having… real nightmares. And she didn’t know how to deal with it, she was all like ‘you need to quit that crazy rebel stuff, girl’, every time, and I couldn't, you know? I _can’t_.”

Her thin arms tighten around Mike, and she takes a shuddery little breath against his throat.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Mike says. “With us.” He dares to run his hand over the delicate chain of her spine, up and down.

“I hope so,” Julie says, in a weird, small voice. She takes another breath, shifts around like she’s gonna pull away—Mike firms his hand on her back, keeps her against him.

“No, don’t,” he says, “I _want_ you here,” and she goes very still.

“Okay,” she says, barely audible. “Mike...” Mike rubs her back again and she gives a little shiver, breath catching, but stays put.

“You could tell me,” he says. “When you have— when you’re, uh—”

“Nightmares?” Julie asks. “Or, um—”

“Anything,” Mike says firmly.

“These last couple weeks have been a nightmare,” Julie says. “You were, um. The way you looked.”

“Not so great, huh?” He tries to laugh and it comes out pretty bad.

“No,” she says. Takes a deep, shaky breath. “I mean, yeah. But. Um. When you looked at me. That’s. It was... you were scared of me, and I don’t. Want that. That’s, um. My nightmares. Mostly.”

Mike cups the back of her neck, his heart twisting inside his chest all of a sudden. Julie only ever gets incoherent like this when she’s flat-out miserable. He didn’t know things had gotten so bad for her.

“It wasn’t real,” he says. “I wasn’t scared of you for any _real_ reason, Jules, you know that, right—”

“You could be,” Julie says. “I don’t know why Dad turned out like that, you know, so— so I could, too, what if I turn out like that, everything he’s ever _done_ he thought was _right_ and I think I’m doing the right thing too and what if it _isn’t_ and I wake up one day and you’re _looking_ at me like that and you’re _right_! You _should_ be scared of me!”

Julie hasn’t referred to Abraham Kane as her dad in a long time, pretty much since she told the Burners her secret and left Deluxe for good. She didn’t even sound like she noticed saying it just now. She’s shivering all over, breathing fast and ragged, and she makes a quiet little wet noise, a sniffle. It makes Mike want to fight the whole world for her right this minute, just so it’d stop making her unhappy.

“Shh, shh, Jules, it’s okay, shh,” Mike goes, instead, and holds her tightly.

“It’s not okay!” she protests. “It’s not okay, _you’re_ not okay!”

“I’m okay now, it’s over,” Mike says. “I’m fine, it was just a stupid burr, it was all fake, it’s _okay_.”

Texas makes a loud, rough noise from the floor, and the two of them freeze against each other. There’s the sound of Texas snuffling and rolling over, and then his breathing evens back out as he falls deeper into sleep.

“Yeah, well, you care about what’s right,” Mike whispers to her. “You listen to people and, and figure things out, and admit when you get things wrong. You help people. You’re helping _me_.”

Julie shakes her head against him. “I just— I'm scared to— to wake up one day and, and find out I'm— him. Someone who hurt you. Someone who, who would lose you and _deserve_ to lose you. Or— or lose anyone. I mean.”

“I wouldn’t let you,” Mike says. “Okay? You look out for me and I’ll look out for you and we’ll be okay. And neither of us has to be scared alone. We can be, ha, we’ll be scared together.”

She takes another of those long, shivering breaths, then nods.

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, okay, yeah. Deal.”

“Deal.” Mike rubs her back again and this time she doesn’t tense up against him. She relaxes, bit by bit, goes soft and sleepy under his hands. Her breath against his shoulder goes deep and sighing, and he’s fiercely glad for it. He loves being able to take care of her, like this, in the dark when she’s so small and vulnerable.

“You’ve got a lot of people in your corner, y’know,” he offers. “There’s all us guys, and Claire too, you know you don’t have to carry everything on your own. When you help people, you gotta let them help you back.”

“I know, I know...” she sighs. “Jeez. I kinda... I miss Claire, she’s with the Amazons now like all the time, feels like we never see each other around anymore. Just chat, sometimes. It probably serves me right, but.... it sucks.”

“You’re not getting enough sleepovers,” Mike says, and pats her shoulder. “That’s your real problem.”

“Ha,” she huffs, but he can tell she’s smiling. “Yeah, that’s probably it. Bet if I asked Claire for one she’d die of shock.”

“Pff. Well, you should though, if you wanna. Make a date, go hang out! You deserve to just have some, like, girl time. Take your mind off all of this— uh, this _this_.”

“It’s been a lot of _this_ , hasn’t it.”

“Too much this,” Mike says. “That’s your other problem.”

She gives a sleepy little snicker. “Yeah... I will, though. ‘S a good idea.” Then she sighs, thumps her head against his shoulder. “‘M sorry for all the... the freakin’ out at you, though. Was supposed'a be talkin' about you... Sorry...”

Mike swallows hard. “Don’t be,” he says quietly. “Come on, that’s no big deal, you can… you can talk to me, about your stuff. Please.”

Julie’s arms tighten around him. “Okay,” she says, voice just as low. “I... thanks, Mike. You’re... you’re great, y'know that, right?”

“About as well as you do, I bet,” Mike says wryly. It earns him another snicker, and her arms tighten around him in a renewed hug.

“So we’re both great,” she murmurs. “Glad we got that... cleared up.”

She’s definitely falling asleep again, but that’s cool. Mike is, too.

“If you have more nightmares,” Mike remembers. “You can… ask, for, like. More hugs. Or just talking. Whatever you want from me.”

“…Ice cream 'n ponies?”

“Okay, no. Just hugs or talking. Ice cream and ponies are gonna have to wait till morning.”

“ _Booo_ ,” Julie goes, and nudges his neck hard with her nose. Mike laughs a little, and gives her a really good, firm hug, and flops backwards on the couch with her. Stretching out, shifting around till they’re both comfortable. It does feel really good, to hold someone in the dark.

“‘M I squishing you?” Julie asks, already sounding mostly gone.

“You weigh like, nothing,” Mike assures her, and she makes a small offended noise and digs her chin into his shoulder. “Okay, but you’re pointy, ow, good job.”

“‘S right,” she mumbles, and yawns, and turns her face enough that her cheek’s against him instead. He yawns, too, and closes his eyes.

“Y’gotta tell me if you get a nightmare,” he tells her, but she must not, because he doesn’t wake up again until morning.

When he wakes, Julie’s still lying on him, peaceful and still. Which is both good and very not good, because Mike is fully awake now and his _body_ is fully awake and—he just definitely, absolutely has to move before Julie wakes up, is all. That would be. Really awkward. Or worse, she might be offended, and that—Mike stops, reexamines that thought. Julie might be offended and get mad, which… would suck, of course, Mike doesn’t want his friends mad at him… but the thought doesn’t call up the same surge of violent, overwhelming terror that it has for the last couple weeks.

Wow. He takes a deep breath and lets it out. It’s still upsetting, and still, okay, a little scary to think about, but not like it was. He can deal with this.

That’s kind of exciting, actually. He must be getting better, the effects of the burr finally going away.

Doesn’t change the fact that he’s still got to get out from under Julie without waking her or, uh, pressing anything against her too much. That’s okay, though, he can do this.

Getting his hands under her—without touching anything he shouldn’t—he very carefully tries to lift her just enough to shift out from underneath. Her breathing changes, but she doesn’t twitch until he’s out from under her, perched on the edge of the couch trying to lay her down gently. As his hands pull back, she shifts and makes a little waking, questioning noise.

Texas is still asleep on the floor, so Mike keeps his voice low.

“Morning. You can go back to sleep, it’s fine.”

“Mnrgh,” Julie mumbles. “Friggin’ cadet schedule. ‘M up.”

Mike laughs softly, patting her shoulder. “Yeah, all right,” he murmurs. “You take your time, Jules.”

She grumbles into the couch cushions and doesn’t move, and Mike is grinning as he slips out of the room and heads for the bathroom. He takes care of things, and washes up, brushes his teeth, and he’s just washing his face when there’s a knock on the door.

“You okay?” Julie says outside, and Mike twitches guiltily.

“Fine,” he says. “You can open the door, it’s fine!” As soon as he says it he wonders if it smells in here, if it’s obvious what he was doing, or if the sharp scent of the soap is enough to cover it up.

Julie pushes open the door and steps in. “Are you—your cuts and stuff, are they doing okay?” Her eyes drop to his bare arms, the long thin line of a scabbed-over scratch, shallow to start with and not really hurting anymore.

“Yeah, healing pretty well,” Mike says, and straightens abruptly as he remembers. “Ahh, shoot—um, I took most of the bandages off yesterday and changed everything that still needed it, but I couldn’t change the one on my back. Could you, uh, you think you could give it a look, make sure everything’s okay, maybe change the bandage? I know it’s kinda gross—”

“No it’s not, stop it,” Julie says, rolling her eyes. “Of course I will. I just…” She steps forward, lifts a hand to brush her fingertips lightly over the scratch on his arm, frowning. “We should’ve figured it out sooner. I’m sorry I didn’t.”

“What, no! Jules, come on, you guys have been great! _You’ve_ been great, geez, don’t feel bad! I mean, come on, you’re helpin’ me right now!” In illustration, Mike pulls his t-shirt off, folds it and puts it on the counter beside the sink.

Julie opens her mouth, blinks a few times, and gives him a tense smile. “Yeah, okay, cowboy. Turn around and I’ll give it a look.”

Mike turns around and she gently peels off the waterproofed bandage between his shoulder blades.

“Hmm,” she says. “Gimme the first aid kit.”

He gets it out and opens it on the counter. “Everything okay?”

“Pretty sure,” Julie says absently, grabbing a bottle and some gauze. “Can’t hurt to put some more stuff on it, though.”

Mike stands patiently while she pats wet gauze over the scab, which, okay, hurts a little, but it’s not a big deal. Eventually she finishes messing with it and puts another bandage on, but then she starts fussing with another spot lower on his back, tracing over the line of a cut with antiseptic.

“Did you take care of the cuts on your front?” she asks.

Mike glances down at the deep scratch across his chest, which is itching in that annoying way healing scabs do. The ones on his sides and stomach are mostly shallower, healing fast.

“I don’t think they need it, they’re pretty much healed and stuff.”

“Mm,” Julie says, and stops dabbing at his back. “Turn around.”

Mike’s shoulders hunch a little as he turns. “I… I really can take care of myself, Jules.”

She looks up to meet his eyes, startled. “I know you can,” she says after a minute. “Mike, I know. But… we all wanna take care of you, too. Weren't you just telling me that last night, you gotta let the people you care about, care for you? We were doing such nasty things to you in those dreams, I just… it seems like we should try to even it out, you know? Overwrite all the bad stuff with better, uh, stuff. Right?”

“Yeah,” he says softly. “Sure, Jules.”

She looks at his sides and front, dabs the stuff on the gauze over a couple of cuts, and frowns at the deeper one on his chest. Her hands are gentle and— nice-looking, elegant, as small and sharp and efficient as all the rest of her.  He has to think very carefully about breakfast and kale in everything to deal with her fingertips running cautiously over the cuts on his abdomen, spreading the antiseptic gel in one hot, tingling line after another.

Finally she finishes with the one on his chest, he thinks, although she’s still looking at it, nibbling distractedly on her lip. Her fingers are resting on his left collarbone, thumb running absently along the ridge, and he has to take two breaths before he can manage words.

“Everything look okay?”

She blinks and drops her hand, stepping back. “Yup!” she says brightly. “You look—it all looks good, healing well!”

“Great!” he says, relieved. “Thanks for this.”

“Oh, hah, no problem!” she says. “Hey, I’m gonna go find some breakfast.” She ducks out of the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

Mike blinks at the closed door a second before deciding not to overthink it. He didn’t do anything to upset her or make her mad, she’s just hungry. Actually, so is he.

Pulling on his shirt and jacket, he goes to join her. Breakfast is nice. It’s just the two of them, since Chuck and Dutch are still asleep, apparently, and it’s really nice to hang out with Julie alone for once. Not that he doesn’t love the other guys, because he does, but one on one time is great.

After breakfast Julie says she wants to give Nine Lives some attention, a good going-over, and invites Mike to help. Mike is delighted, of course, so they go out to the garage and do that. Julie takes off her vest, and Mike drops his jacket on Mutt’s hood, and they both get a little greasy and tease each other about it, and it’s just— _great_. A little awkward for Mike a couple of times, because there’s a lot of bending over when you’re working on a car, and Julie’s jeans are kind of tight, but he manages not to look much and he’s pretty sure she didn’t notice. Unless that was why she went kind of quiet at one point, she was thinking about whether or not to say something. He doesn’t think so, though; he was wiggling out from under the car at the time, not watching her.

Anyway, it’s an awesome way to spend a couple of hours. And it’s great to have a chance to be _normal_ again, just working on a car and hanging out, like Mike does, like Burners do.

Texas comes in after a while, swaggers over to watch the tune-up for a few minutes and check up on Mike. He’s being ridiculously solicitous, for Texas, and Mike is touched. Mike tries to make it clear that he’s fine, and no nightmare Burners have been seen anywhere, everything’s fine. Texas watches his face intently and nods, satisfied.

“Okay, Tiny. Texas gotta take off right now, got some guy stuff to take care of, and Julie should look after you alright. But hey, if they show up, if any of those fake evil guys start givin’ you a hard time, you call Texas up, okay? I’ll be _right_ here to kick butt!” He flexes a few times, claps Mike on the shoulder and strides over to Stronghorn.

Julie rolls her eyes when he guns the engine before tearing out of the garage, but she’s smiling. “You won’t need to call Texas,” she tells Mike. “I’ve got your back. I’d take care of any evil bad guys before he could even get back in the car.” She flexes one slender, wirey arm, grinning at him.

“Those poor Nega-Burners,” he says solemnly. “They just don’t know what they’re in for.”

“We're sure gonna show 'em,” Julie says. By the time they finish it’s nearly lunchtime, and they’re cleaning up when Chuck and Dutch finally come downstairs together. They look… well, happy, Mike guesses. Dutch is grinning a lot, and looking at Chuck a lot, and just sort of beaming in a kind of smug way, and Chuck is doing the same thing right back and practically  _bouncing_ when he walks.

Julie takes one looks at both of them, pats Mike on the arm and says, “You know what? I’m gonna take off for awhile.”

Mike blinks at her, and he’s trying not to look alarmed but it’s not easy to tell himself everything’s okay. She’s not mad at him, he didn’t disappoint her or annoy her into leaving, it’s fine.

Her expression softens and she puts her hand on his shoulder. “I called Claire before breakfast,” she explains. “She wanted to get together like, as soon as possible, so I’m heading over there now.”

“Oh!” he says, equal parts relieved and feeling kind of dumb. “Hey, awesome! Tell her hi from me. You girls have a great time!”

“Thanks!” she says, and waves over her shoulder on her way around the car.

Mike tries not to worry as she gets in Nine Lives and drives away: it’s not like she’s leaving forever, she’s not going to quit the Burners for the Amazons even if her best friend is already there. He’ll see her again soon. This is just a normal way friends are with each other, they leave because it’s no big deal and they come back like it’s no big deal.

It’s fine. He’s fine. He’s getting better.

*

Mike gets himself lunch while Chuck and Dutch are rustling around for their breakfast, and the three of them sit down in the booth to eat together. It’s nice! All friendly and relaxed and stuff.

It’d just be nicer if Mike wasn’t so puzzled, and kind of trying not to be worried about this _new_ thing.

Because the thing is, it looks a lot like Dutch and Chuck got together last night. Like, for  _most_ of last night. He’s having trouble thinking of anything else that explains the way they’re acting. But until now, Mike was pretty sure Dutch was with Tennie. He knows Dutch is a good guy who wouldn’t go behind someone’s back like that, but he’s not sure how else to interpret what he’s seeing.

He worries about maybe annoying Dutch by being nosy for only about half of breakfast before going ahead and asking the question. “So hey, how’s it going with Tennie?”

Chuck kind of freezes, stops munching on one of Jacob’s sauerkraut muffins and slowly puts it down, looking over at Dutch. “Yeah, how— _jeez,_ I didn't even think— how are things?”

Dutch blinks from Mike to Chuck. “Uh, good? Things are great.”

Mike nibbles his lip. Chuck brushes his bangs back to frown extra-pointedly at Dutch.

Dutch’s eyes widen. “Oh! Oh, _things_ , oh.” He looks over at Mike, and before Mike can offer to leave, let them talk this out in private, Dutch drops his head a little and laughs. “No, geez, it’s fine, she’s fine, uh… It’s, we’ve got an open relationship. She actually usually likes girls. So uh. Yeah.”

“Ohhhhh, cool,” Chuck says, sounding relieved, and goes back to eating his muffin while Mike wonders what the heck an open relationship is.

Dutch takes a bite of his own elderberry muffin. “Yeah, I was kind of a surprise, apparently.”

Chuck nods and there’s a moment of silent munching. Then he makes a muffled squeaking noise, swallows, and says in dawning delight, “Oh my god. Dutch, are _you_ the slice on the side?”

Dutch’s lips thin and he slides Chuck a sideways look, breaking his muffin in half. Chuck just grins wider.

“Haha, you _totally are!_ That’s amazing.”

“Shut up,” Dutch says, half amused and half annoyed. “You know how it is, I don’t live there, I got plenty on my plate as is without tryin’ to shuttle back and forth every day, so, yeah. I’m the side dish, laugh it up.”

“I’m sure she misses your meaty protein,” Chuck says, almost straight-faced, and Dutch gives him a look of utter exasperation and shoulder bumps him hard.

"Man, I'll give you some protein, I'll give you a knuckle sandwich, you big nerd—"

" _Nerd!_ Me!?" Chuck puts a hand to his chest, trying to act wounded, but he keeps grinning and it's ruining the effect. Mike finds himself smiling along, even though he's pretty much totally lost. 

"So... Side dish?" Mike ventures, hoping for an explanation. 

Chuck shoots him an odd, questioning glance, like he's not sure what Mike's getting at. "Yeah, y'know— someone you're seeing in another department, like, fooling around with. Serious stuff is for home, away is for play. Cadets didn't do that?”

Mike shakes his head, totally floored. Cadets didn't do  _anything_ like that, serious or not. Fraternization was— it was— it just  _wasn't_. You didn't. 

"Tennie acted like that kind of thing was totally normal," Dutch offers. "Her Dad's got an _Amazon_ babe, if you can believe it. Chuck, I'm guessing you did this kinda thing back in Deluxe with your tech bros?"

Chuck shrugs back. “Pretty much. Real relationships were for the people you spend every day with. Guys from other departments were for fun. The Cablers have so many techie expats, I’m not surprised they’re sticking with what works."

They smile at each other, and Mike smiles a little watching them. He doesn’t really get how what they’re talking about works, definitely doesn’t understand why Dutch seems perfectly happy to… not be that important to Tennie? Mike thinks that sounds like it’d _suck_. But if Dutch is happy, and Tennie’s happy, and no one’s lying about anything, that’s all that matters, and the rest is none of his business.

The piece Mike understands nice and clear is that Chuck and Dutch are together now, which puts them _way_ off limits. Which is fine! Obviously it’s fine, it’s great that they like each other and they’re having fun together, it’s really cute. They’re a good fit, both smart, creative types. It makes perfect sense.

And… if he’s honest with himself, it’s not like he would’ve figured out how to pick either one of them over the other Burners anytime soon. Even assuming one of them was interested, he just… can’t choose, and it wouldn’t be fair to whoever he was with when he’s still got so many dumb feelings for all of his other friends. Because… it’s not like that’d stop. If he could have just _made_ it stop by trying it would have, and, it totally hasn’t. There’s a reason he tries not to think about this kind of thing.

The news about Tennie kinda comes as a shock, though. He had kind of assumed she and Dutch would get married someday.

“Hey, man,” Dutch says, “everything okay?”

Mike looks up with a start from frowning into his nearly empty bowl of chili. Dutch’s smile is quizzical and a little uncertain, and Mike realizes with a jolt that he’s worried Mike doesn’t approve.

“Fine!” he says, with a sheepish grin. “Sorry, I was just distracted. Everything’s fine.”

Dutch relaxes, but Chuck’s lips part and his head tilts.

“Mikey,” he says cautiously, “do you…” He glances at Dutch and they have some kind of exchange Mike can’t quite figure out. By the set of Dutch’s mouth and the way Chuck huffs, it seems to be an argument.

“Um,” Chuck says a minute later. “You don’t get it, do you.”

“I get it!” Mike says, defensive. “It’s not that complicated.”

Chuck’s mouth gets a dubious slant. “Seriously, bro?”

Mike glares at him. “Fine! Maybe I don’t get it, but I don’t have to! So long as you guys are all making each other happy, it’s all good,” he says firmly, and goes back to finishing his chili.

“Man,” Dutch says, shaking his head and giving Mike an affectionate smile, “sometimes I can’t believe what a cool guy you are.”

Mike blinks and smiles back, warmth welling up through him. He doesn’t need any more than what he’s got with these guys, because what he’s got is amazing. His friends are the best.

Chuck is smiling a little too, although he looks wryer than Dutch. “Be honest, dude. What we’re doing seems kinda messed up to you, doesn’t it?”

“No!” Mike says immediately, warmth wiped out by sudden alarm. “I— I wasn’t thinking that, I wouldn’t, I mean, Dutch is a good guy, you're both—I didn’t mean to be like—” he looks from Dutch to Chuck and back again, heart pounding in his chest. “—I’m sorry,” he offers. “I’m not judging either of you, honest.”

“But you’re gettin’ all wound up, now,” Dutch frowns. “Dude, chill, it’s fine you were concerned. You couldn’ta known any better.”

Mike shrugs, still worried. Because isn’t _that_ the story of his life: _Mike Chilton, he couldn’t have known any better._

“Hey, we’re not mad,” Chuck says. He leans forward, pats Mike’s hand carefully. His smile is tentative now. “Buddy, come on. We’re just talking.”

“We’re talking about relationships over brunch,” Dutch says, and eats another bit of his muffin. “No one tell Texas. He’ll have like, a macho melt-down.”

Chuck _giggles_ , which is roughly the cutest thing Mike’s seen all day, and probably proves Dutch’s point. He starts to relax again, his chest unclenching.

“Anyway, looks like you didn’t know open relationships were a thing, which kinda explains some stuff,” Dutch says. “Like—”

“Your earlier concerns,” Chuck finishes, and Dutch raises his eyebrows. Chuck brushes his bangs back long enough to give Dutch a real stern look.

“Yeah, those,” Dutch says blandly. “Okay. Anyway, it's just... it's nothin' like what I was raised with, but it's really nice, sharing. Having more than one person to care about, and knowing the people you like, the people you're into, other people are too, because they're just that great, and you can share how great it is with each other and it's even better. So maybe you gotta figure out the best way for everyone to get what they want and when they want it, but…” he shrugs. “It’s worth the fuss.”

“Sharing,” Mike repeats, and he feels like… he’s not sure. Something tight and old and painful inside him is coming loose, maybe.  _Sharing_.

 _I could have all of them_ , Mike thinks, and bites his spoon kind of hard. No, he couldn’t, that’s dumb, but… just knowing other people don’t stop at only one partner. That feels good. Knowing it’s okay to not want to choose because maybe there could be a situation where no one would have to choose, or like, everyone could choose eachother. That feels really good.

“…Mike?” Chuck asks. He pats Mike’s hand again. “You okay in there?”

Mike nods, hastily, and squeezes Chuck’s hand tightly before letting go. “Yeah, I’m fine, I’m great,” he says. He can’t quite meet either of their gazes right now. “I just— uh. Sharing. I— that’s cool.”

“It’s pretty great,” Dutch says hesitantly. “I mean, like… uh…” Mike looks up to see Dutch pulling his muffin into increasingly smaller fragments. “…If you think about it.”

“Right,” Mike says, uncertainly. Because. He definitely is.

“ANYWAY,” Chuck says loudly, and they both jump. “What’re everyone’s plans for today? Mike, you busy with anything?”

“I didn’t really have plans,” Mike says. “Julie took off pretty fast to hang with Claire, so, I guess I’m up for whatever.”

“Sounds nice, maybe you’n Chuck can figure somethin’ out.” Dutch says. “I wanna get back to some projects I was in the middle of. I mean I like bein’ around you chumps just fine, but alone time is callin’ my name.”

“ _Duuuutch,”_ Chuck whispers loudly. “ _Paint another hot naked girl, Duuuutch._ ”

“Man! Shut up! I’ll paint _you_ naked!” Dutch says, slapping at him, and Chuck giggles and slaps back and it’s— really couple-y, wow. Mike turns his attention to scraping up the very last spoonful of chilli while Chuck gets Dutch in a headlock and pulls on one of his ears, and Dutch laughs and kicks.

“Man, go— go away, like, go do some driving with Mike!” Dutch says.

“Oh, hey,” Chuck says, like that’s something he actually wants to do, and Mike looks up to see Dutch all sprawled back in the booth, one of his long slim legs somehow slung up over Chuck’s shoulder, Chuck holding on to big fistfuls of Dutch’s shirt with the wirey muscle in his forearms arms all corded up, both of them smiling at him. He swallows kind of hard.

“Yeah?” Mike says. “You’d, uh, you’d want to?”

Chuck grins at him. “Yeah! I mean—you’ve been sleeping just fine lately, right? You look good. Um! I mean, ahaha, _healthy_.”

“What if you guys got in some Blonde Thunder time,” Dutch says. “Been awhile since you had any, right?”

Since about a week before Mike got sick, yeah. Chuck chews on his lips for a long minute, then says, decisively, “Yeah. Yeah, let’s do it.”

…If sleeping with Dutch makes Chuck this much more gung-ho for driving lessons, Mike is _all for it._


	7. Chapter 7

Dutch soaks up the peace and quiet while he paints. He definitely misses having ROTH around to fetch and move things for him, but the little guy was so excited to go along with Jacob and Hudson as pit crew that Dutch couldn't say no. But aside from ROTH, it's real nice to not deal with people hanging around watching. This way he can try out one goofy idea after the next with no one around to ask questions or get judgey. He likes showing off for his friends, not messing up in front of them— especially not on a day like this one, where he keeps thinking about Chuck under his hands, or Mike staring at him all wide-eyed and hungry over breakfast, and his head’s not in the usual creative space. He ends up scrapping a lot of sketches for being either too silly or too gross for a full-size render, until he hits on a good sketch of a thin, pale bikini babe, surfing on a shark, with blonde hair that falls in her eyes. After a little internal debate, he upgrades the girl’s chest from _generous_ to _completely improbable_ , and colors the bikini blue.

He’s just shading in some white lightning stripes on the shark when Blonde Thunder rumbles back into the garage. The racecar gives a sweet, throaty growl as it downshifts and parks neatly by Mutt, and then Chuck comes spilling out of the driver’s side, all smiles, and yells across the garage,

“Dutch, check it out, I drove all the whAT IS _THAT!?”_

“You don’t like it?” Dutch asks, innocently. “I was thinkin’ of you while you were gone.”

“Oh my god,” Chuck says. “You absolute aaaAAAH MIKE DON’T LOOK.”

Mike immediately leans around Chuck and looks, then bursts out laughing.

“Is that _Chuck?_ ” he demands, falling back against Blonde Thunder’s hood.

“Why you gotta ask that, man, I thought it was a real good likeness,” Dutch grins, and cups his hands up in front of his chest. “Y’know, really illustrating our boy’s best assets!”

Mike wheezes helplessly. It’s a damn good look on him.

“Shut the f— both of you shut up!” Chuck says. “You’re horrible! This is horrible! Gordy, I’m gonna hack your hands and make you slap yourself all day, see if I don’t!”

“I can’t believe you don’t like it,” Dutch says, with as straight a face as possible, and finally starts laughing when Chuck gives an enraged screech and lunges for him, fists swinging. He’s not trying to knock Dutch’s head off or anything but the guy really just does _not_ know his own strength, and Dutch is probably the worst at hand-to-hand of any of them. He takes a couple bruising hits to his arms before he dives for cover behind Mike, and Chuck draws up just short of punching Mike, flushed all over and kind of magnificent.

Mike has frozen up, between them, and isn’t laughing anymore. He’s not even breathing. Dutch abruptly feels like complete garbage.

“Sorry,” Dutch offers.

“Uh— w-what?” Mike stammers. He’s staring tensely at Chuck, who’s fading from indignant to horrified, his hands now clutched up close to his chest.

“Sorry you guys can’t like, appreciate my artistic genius!” Dutch says, and slings an arm around Mike’s shoulders. He’s _definitely_ not imagining how Mike leans into him, pressing close for comfort. “Dude, sit down and tell me how Chuck did.”

He steers Mike over to his stool, pushes him gently down and then pretends not to see Mike taking some really careful, steadying breaths while Dutch flips the bikini girl painting over and starts straightening up his cans and rags and stuff.

“Don’t you go anywhere, Chuck!” he calls out as he sees Chuck make as if to slink away.

“I— yeah, yeah! You don’t have to go,” Mike says. “Sorry.”

“No, I’m, um, I’m sorry, too,” Chuck mumbles. “I was just kidding around.”

“Some kidding,” Dutch says. “You kid any harder and I’ll need robot arms!”

“Like you wouldn’t love robot arms,” Chuck snorts.

“Like _you_ wouldn’t love my robot arms,” Dutch says, and is delighted to see Chuck blush. “Ha _ha_ , you’re thinkin’ about it!”

Mike is starting to smile again, kind of shyly. “Guys,” he says, in that familiar, mom-ish tone. “C’mon.”

“Yeah, okay, okay,” Dutch says. “So, how’d Chuck do?”

“He’s really getting the hang of it!” Mike says proudly. Chuck makes an inarticulate bashful noise and Mike goes on, “I was gonna go easy on him today, but he was really pushin’ himself out there— and we made a real breakthrough like, on where to fit Thunder into the team, right?”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah, it’s like—” Mike hesitates, looks to Chuck, swipes his hands through his hair, “—we really mess ourselves up when we just assume Chuck has to be more like me to be a good fighter. He doesn’t. He’s gotta be like himself, ‘cuz, he’s great just how he is, right?”

“Guys,” Chuck squeaks. “Jeez! _Guys!_ ”

“Yeah,” Dutch says firmly. Chuck looks like he wants to die from embarrassment. It is the cutest.

“And Chuck does his best work long-range,” Mike continues. “When he’s got the space to plan his shots— that’s something we had to figure out at first, when we were getting Mutt together, when to get in close and when I had to pull back. So we were thinking, let Thunder be our sniper.”

“Oh _man_ ,” Dutch says.

“I know,” Mike grins.

“Oh man that’s _so cool_ — he could use that turbo boost to get clear—”

“I knew you’d get it! Chuck, didn’t I say, didn’t I say that was a great idea and Dutch would think so too?”

Chuck makes another mortified noise and waves his hands around.

“So you’d use the turbo boost to keep your distance from opponents, keep your driving simple, and we could soup up all your guns and stuff, get you missiles, maybe a drone complement,” Dutch says. “You could be just as heavy a hitter as Stronghorn without having to get in the middle of things, it’d _work_!”

“Really?” Chuck finally asks. “It’s not just a, a, a dumb coward’s plan?”

“Nuh-uh. Mike and Texas are already more than happy to get right up in the middle of the action. Julie and I are kind of switch hitters, we do alright short and long-range— but if we had a car _just_ for long-range stuff, Julie and I would be more free to do, I don’t know, mid-range? We wouldn’t have to divide our attention so much.”

“If we can get the weight and speed right, on Thunder, you should be able to have an effective response range of _miles_ ,” Mike says happily. “Cram a bunch of signal boosters and channel slicers under the dashboard and you can be a mobile comm tower, too.”

“Park somewhere, hack stuff, blow up anything that gets too close. I _love_ it!” Dutch exults.

Chuck sits down hard on one of Dutch’s workbenches, and leans his elbows on his knees.

“Okay,” he says. “Okay, if you think it’s a good plan, too.”

“Chuck, you idiot, it’s brilliant,” Dutch says fondly.

“Told you!” Mike says, grinning at Chuck.

Chuck snorts and rakes a hand through his hair. “Stop gloating,” he mutters, but he’s started to smile.

Mike doesn’t take it the wrong way, just keeps looking pleased with himself. “Of course,” he says, waving a hand as he looks back to Dutch, “we’re gonna have to update our formations when Chuck is driving full time, but the flexibility in maneuvers—”

“Yeah,” Dutch says, eye caught. “Yeah, it’s gonna be great… Hey, gimme that hand for a minute.” He grabs a pen as Mike offers his hand, smile going puzzled, and Dutch starts drawing skeletal finger bones on the back of it. He’s wanted to try something out for awhile, and grins triumphantly when the grey ink starts to sizzle and then glow blue-white, the nano-LED suspension starting to draw power from Mike’s bioelectric field.

“Is that toxic?” Chuck asks.

“Nope!” Dutch says.

“Is it permanent?” Mike asks.

“Nn—uh. We’ll find out?” Dutch shrugs sheepishly. “It should wipe right off with a magnet. If my calculations are right.”

“That’s _so cool_ ,” Mike says. He watches closely as Dutch finishes the smooth lines of his metacarpals and then moves on to do stylized boxy shapes for the wrist bones.

“Hey, get your jacket off,” Dutch says, finishing the lunate carpal and squinting thoughtfully at the rest of Mike’s arm.

“Oh! Uh— sure, yeah!” Mike says, and his— okay, wow, his cheeks are a little flushed, but his smile’s easy, and he peels the black leather off without hesitation. Dutch’s own cheeks feel hot, now, and Chuck’s making a very particular warning kind of grimace, but, whatever. The glowing ink looks _amazing_ against Mike’s warm brown-gold skin, and Dutch is on a roll. He wants to paint Mike up all shining and gorgeous, impress him. Enjoy him? It’s a little confusing when your canvas is your subject is your audience.

But also: awesome. Mike offers Dutch his arm again, muscles laid thick over the bones, skin striped here and there with little scars. Dutch discards the idea of following the hand bone design up with a radius and ulna, and turns them quickly into a winding highway that loops and twists all over Mike’s arm, then two dragons coiled and fighting. He puts in tires and stars and robots and insects and whatever else he can think of, while Mike and Chuck slowly pick up their conversation about the tech Chuck wants to put in Blonde Thunder.

Before Dutch really thinks twice, he’s made it up to Mike’s shoulder, as far as his t-shirt’s sleeve goes, even folded up a couple times, and he skips over the couple inches of fabric to draw a dragon’s head along what bit of Mike’s clavicle shows past his shirt collar. Mike takes a startled breath and holds it.

“Cool, thanks,” Dutch says, absently, and draws like four swords sticking through the dragon’s head, stretching up along the stark, beautiful line of Mike’s throat. Mike’s holding really, really still for this, now, in between slow, shallow sips of air, and Dutch adds flies buzzing over the kill and turning into helicopters and mixing with more stars all the way up until just underneath Mike’s ear.

Then Mike makes a rough, weird little noise, half-swallowed, and jerks away from him.

“Hey— what?” Dutch asks, stupidly, and realizes he’s kind of— they’ve kind of gotten really close, Dutch’s legs right between Mike’s thighs and his free hand on Mike’s jaw and their mouths are…

Mike’s mouth is really close, and open, and his face is flushed all over. His eyes are wide and dark and glittering with the light from the pen. He looks blatantly turned on, but he also looks _trapped._

“Sorry,” he and Dutch say, at like exactly the same time. Dutch steps back and Mike brings his knees together, then slides off the stool entirely.

“I’m gonna— I’m gonna go— look at this in the mirror, thanks, uh—” Mike says, breathlessly, running his hand through his hair, “—okay bye!”

He heads out of the garage _really fast._

“Dutch, you _asshole_ ,” Chuck says.

Dutch sits down on the recently vacated stool, trying to catch his own breath. “Fuck, he’s so _pretty_ ,” he says. “I wanna draw on him like _all over_. Fuck!”

Chuck sighs. “Yeah, I know. But like. _Dutch_. You _asshole_.”

Dutch waves his hand vaguely, conceding the point.

*

After taking care of himself in the nearest bathroom— which is kind of getting to be a bad habit, jeez— Mike slouches guiltily back into the garage to find it empty. Dutch and Chuck have gone off somewhere, probably together, probably to— to spend time together, though the light-up pen has been left on the stool, which is… Good, maybe? If Mike had to stand here and think about Dutch holding Chuck down like he’d held Mike, like while Dutch and Chuck were making out, and drawing on him, for making-out purposes, then. That would be bad. But the pen is still here and Dutch and Chuck aren’t so Mike can stop thinking about it _right now_.

Mike sighs, kicks at a rag on the floor, scrubs his hands through his hair again. He’s okay. He’s doing _fine_. He’s going to go see about starting in on some of the mods he and Chuck were talking about for Blonde Thunder.

He gets to work. Dutch and Chuck come back after a while and work on their own projects, and it’s nice, even if they’re both kind of distractible. Chuck comes and helps Mike for a bit, but then Dutch catches his eye and suddenly he’s mumbling an excuse and ducking into a storage room, and a moment later Dutch follows him in.

Mike just tries not to think about it. That would be easier if they didn’t do it all over again when they come out, but they do. They keep giving each other these _looks_ , and they’ll work for a while and then both slip out into another room and come back flushed and grinning and disheveled, and it’s—fine. It’s fine. Mike can handle this, everything’s fine.

He’s working under Blonde Thunder’s hood, jacket thrown on the roof, when there’s a familiar rumbling roar and Stronghorn pulls into the garage. Texas hops out and swaggers over when Mike waves. He’s coming in for a careful shoulder punch when his eyes catch on the shining art spread across Mike’s skin and he stops short, blinking.

“Tiny, what the heck…?”

“Dutch has this glowy ink!” Mike says, holding out his decorated arm. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“ _Dude_ ,” Texas says, grabbing his arm to stare at it, and Mike doesn’t even tense, just grins at his enthusiasm. “Dutch’s been holdin’ out on Texas! That’s _awesome!_ Ooh, dragons, nice.” He examines Mike’s whole arm, then leans in close to look at the stuff on his neck. Mike tries to convince himself he can’t feel Texas’s breath on his skin. Then Texas tugs at the neck of Mike’s t-shirt, pulling it down a little, and Mike barely swallows a gasp.

“Oh, that’s it?” Texas says, looking at the blank skin under the impaled dragon’s head. “He didn’t do the rest?”

“The… rest?” Mike says.

“Yeah!” Texas claps him on the arm—still much more gently than usual—and strides away yelling, “Dutch! How come you didn’t do Mike’s chest and stuff? Then he could rip his shirt off next mission and everybody’d be all impressed and junk!”

Dutch pokes his head out from the far storage room where he’s been spending some personal time with Chuck. “Because, Texas, Mike’s got this thing you might not have heard of called _modesty_. Unlike some people, he doesn’t just go taking his shirt off whenever.”

Texas snorts. “Yeah? Sounds dumb. Is that one of those Deluxe things?”

Dutch rolls his eyes and has his mouth open to answer when Chuck says something muffled and Dutch glances back over his shoulder and freezes for a second. Then he ducks back out of sight and the door closes firmly.

Mike sighs quietly to himself. He’s happy for them both, for sure, it’s just kind of weird to have the two of them sneaking off together at every opportunity. Really cute! But a little weird.

Texas frowns and looks back at Mike. “That was weird. What’s up with Dutch?”

Oh right, Texas fell asleep before that all happened. Mike grabs his jacket and busies himself pulling it back on to make sure he doesn’t get a weird look on his face or anything when he says, “Oh, yeah, uh, he and Chuck got together last night.” He looks up with a smile. “So they’re kind of, y’know, all over each other today.”

Open-mouthed, Texas stares at him, over at the closed door, and back at Mike. “What, like, for real? This ain’t, like, messin’ with Texas day?”

“No, Tex,” Mike says, shaking his head and laughing a little. “It’s real. They’re bein’ pretty cute.”

Texas stares at the door some more. “Huh. So they’re, like, makin’ out and junk in there.”

Mike opens his mouth, but it takes a moment to make words. “I— yeah? I guess?” He’s been doing a pretty good job _not_ thinking about exactly what the two of them might be getting up to every time they duck out of sight. Trust Texas to point out the obvious and make that difficult.

“Huh,” Texas says again. “Man, never thought the _nerds_ ’d hook up. Doesn’t Dutch have a girlfriend?”

“They’re sharing. Dutch says she— she uh, mostly likes other girls, so. She doesn’t care who else Dutch likes, either.”

“Dang,” Texas says slowly, staring at the closed door. He takes his hat off, smooths his hair, puts his hat back on. “…And he likes _Chuck_ , huh?”

“Guess so,” Mike says, as neutrally as he can.

Texas looks at Mike, frowns, and says, “It’s like magnets.”

“What?”

“Magnets, li’l guy.” Texas holds his hands out a ways apart, shakes them around, then claps them together decisively. “Skinny nerd magnets, y’know? It was like, inevitable. That’s just science, trust me on this. Real tough macho guys like you’n me, we’re not even on the same wavelength, or like, that’s why— that’s, y’know, science… Happens.” He frowns some more at the door. “Man, what do you think they’re even _doin’_ in there?”

Mike opens his mouth and closes it again, then bops Texas on the shoulder. “Come on, buddy, it’s none of our business—let’s go play a game or something. I think we found all the pool balls again!”

“Oh, sweet!” Texas brightens up. “Dibs on the club!”

“What, no, you got the golf club last time,” Mike protests.

“ _Dibs,”_ Texas repeats, and takes off running. Mike laughs, startled, and chases after him.

*

Dutch and Chuck eventually get guilty about leaving Mike with only Texas for company, and pry themselves apart to emerge from the storage room. Dutch forgot what it was like when he started sleeping with Tennie, where it was hard to think about anything else, but man, he’s definitely hit that stage with Chuck. It’s hard to keep his hands off the guy.

Mike is working on Mutt while Texas keeps him company, but when Dutch and Chuck offer to help, Texas starts being kind of a jerk, giving them both a hard time. It’s obvious that he’s jealous, although Dutch isn’t sure if it’s about them getting laid or about one of them in particular. Dutch is used to dealing with Texas and his toddler-level emotional maturity, but Chuck usually gets squeaky and shrill and annoyed when Texas acts like this. Today he’s handling it with surprising composure, snarking back at Texas without flustering. Must be the endorphins.

Dutch keeps an eye on it anyway, especially when Texas gets right up in Chuck’s space, which is why he sees Texas’s gaze catch on the hickey on one pale collarbone, just peeking out above Chuck’s shirt. Texas stares at it a minute, then, scowling, pokes Chuck in the stomach.

Chuck sputters and twitches backwards, almost bumping into Mike. “What the heck, Texas! Are you _five?_ Poking people without warning is a Nega-jerk kind of move!”

Texas’s mouth opens in outrage. “Wha—no it’s not! Nuh-uh, Texas doesn’t do that Nega junk! I’m _Good Guy_ Texas!”

“I don’t know about that,” Chuck says, crossing his arms and lifting his chin. “I’m pretty sure a good guy wouldn’t be poking people like a toddler who's also an  _evil Nega-dude_.”

Texas gapes a second before rallying and poking Chuck again repeatedly as Chuck squeaks and swats at his hands. “Yeah?” Texas says. “Well, maybe you deserve it cuz _you’re_ the Nega-guy! I’m just protectin’ everybody from Evil Nega Chuck!”

Chuck snorts, a little breathless, fending off Texas’s ticklish assault. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah!” Texas says.

Dutch glances over at Mike, raising his eyebrows. Mike blinks and looks from Texas to Chuck and back to Dutch, obviously confused. Yeah, Dutch didn’t realize either that Texas might have had a thing for Chuck, but he sure is making excuses to get his hands on him all of a sudden.

Chuck squeaks again and giggles. “All right, you know what? Fine! You want Evil Chuck, you’re getting him!” He makes a grab for Texas’s hat and dances back out of reach with it.

Texas stares at him in complete shock at his boldness, then shakes himself and charges with a yell. Chuck’s long legs serve him well as he tears away, establishing an easy lead on Texas.

Dutch grins at Mike again and then notices he's chewing on his lip, worried eyes following Texas.

“Hey,” Dutch says, bumping Mike's shoulder gently. “They're just blowin’ off steam, man, it's cool.”

“Oh!” Mike says, “I, yeah, I know.” He still looks a little unsettled, though.

“You notice Chuck totally started that on purpose?” Dutch adds, watching Chuck dash around the garage, Texas bulling along behind. “Bein’ all coy, _‘catch me if you can’_.”

Not for the first time, now that he thinks about it; Chuck's teased people into chasing him around before. Maybe he likes having someone pursuing him, likes the attention. Dutch makes a mental note to do a little more horsing around with him in the future, because Chuck is ridiculously cute when he's all lit up and giggly like this.

“Wait,” Mike says, eyes widening. “You think he's _flirting?_ ”

Dutch raises his eyebrows and shrugs. “It's definitely flirty, if he means it that way is a whole 'nother question.”

Chuck puts Texas’s hat on as he runs. “Hey, this is really comfy!” he yells. “Maybe I’ll keep it!”

“What, no!” Texas yells. “No nerds in Texas’s hat!”

“Oh, look at that, it’s got nerd cooties all over it!” Chuck says, grinning breathlessly at Dutch and Mike as he goes by again. “Guess it’s mine now!”

“Nerd cooties ain’t even a thing!” Texas hollers.

“But Texas,” Dutch calls out, “last week I thought you said—”

“They’re a thing!” Texas yells over his shoulder. “They just don’t affect Texas’s stuff! Like, I can get ‘em off again!”

Dutch snickers and glances over at Mike again.

Mike is staring from Chuck to Texas. “...Okay, yeah, that's… huh.”

“I think Texas is goin’ for it, too,” Dutch says.

“You think? I dunno, this is kinda normal for Tex, though. Are you sure?”

Dutch hums thoughtfully and watches for another few minutes. Way ahead of Texas and running out of breath, Chuck slows to walk backwards for a second, taunting. He plucks at his shirt to fan himself, a pale crescent of stomach appearing and vanishing again, and Dutch tears his eyes away just in time to catch the way Texas’s stride hitches briefly.

“Yeah,” Dutch says, “I’m sure.”

When he looks back at Chuck, he thinks Chuck might have noticed too, judging by the fact that he almost doesn’t start running in time to get away. The grin he shoots Mike and Dutch in passing this time is wild and incredulous, and Dutch gives him a thumbs up, grinning back.

Then Texas puts on a burst of speed and tackles him, grabbing him around the waist and spinning them both around with momentum. Chuck yelps, whips the hat off and holds it over his head at arms length just as Texas reaches for it.

“Give it!” Texas says. “Texas caught you, now hand it over!”

“Never!” Chuck says. “I won’t surrender so easily!”

Texas growls and lets go with one arm to flex it menacingly at Chuck, and Dutch snickers helplessly.

“Oh my god,” Mike mutters. “Okay, but, does Texas even realize he’s flirting?”

“Who knows, man,” Dutch replies in the same undertone. He gives Mike a sideways look. “Tell you one thing, though, he’s never gettin’ anywhere like that.”

Mike kind of straightens up, looking over at him. “Oh, yeah?”

Dutch snorts. “Course not. I mean, the guy’s hopeless. Come on, would that work on you?”

Chuck yelps and Dutch looks over to see that Texas has picked him up over one shoulder and is carrying him back to Mutt while Chuck still keeps Texas’s hat out of reach. Dutch glances back at Mike… whose cheeks are looking suspiciously rosy.

“Right,” Mike says, much too late. “Yeah, course not.”

Dutch blinks and fixes his eyes on the approaching pair, trying to stop picturing throwing Mike over his shoulder and carrying him off to bed. Chuck is being a real hardass about that. No hitting on Mike for at least a few more days, until they're _sure_ he'll be saying yes for the right reasons. So fine, Dutch isn’t hitting on him. Doesn’t mean he can’t think about it.

“Okay,” Texas says to them, turning his back to show Chuck’s dangling top half, both freckled hands clutching the hat. “Texas won, now one’a you get Texas’s hat back.”

“I dunno, Tex,” Mike says, scratching his jaw thoughtfully. “Chuckles got it fair and square, I don’t think it’d be fair for us to interfere.” He glances at Dutch, who grins broadly.

“Yeah, I’m all about justice, and two or three people ganging up on one just isn’t right. You’re on your own, man.”

“What?!” Texas says, looking back at them. “Lame!”

“Victory is mine!” Chuck says, breathless and scarlet-faced from being upside down.

“ _No_ ,” Texas says, “ _Texas_ won! You just gotta admit it and stop bein’ dumb!” He swings Chuck off his shoulder and over one arm to try to grab for the hat, Chuck shrieking as he’s spun easily around but still gamely keeping the hat out of reach.

Dutch leans in and murmurs in Mike’s ear, “Gotta love it when he gets loud like that, right?”

Mike kind of twitches, going very still. “ _Um?_ ” he says, sounding a little breathless.

“It’s just cute,” Dutch explains, straightening up. “Right?”

“Right!” Mike says in relief, and then, “I mean. Uh. Well.”

“So,” Dutch says, taking mercy on him, “what were you saying about Mutt’s suspension?”

He and Mike work on Mutt for a while, occasionally glancing back at the ongoing scuffle. Texas eventually gets his hat back, then triumphantly pokes Chuck until Chuck threatens to steal it again. It’s really cute, and more than a little distracting, not that Dutch minds.

“So, sharing, huh?” Mike says, when Chuck has figured out that Texas is also ticklish and the background noise level has gotten high again.

Dutch blinks at him. “Theoretically, sure, but Texas’d have to find a clue first. A bunch of clues.”

“Right,” Mike says, nodding. “Cuz he’s not getting anywhere like that.” He looks back over his shoulder and Dutch looks too. Texas is making loud _Hwacha_ ’s and blocking Chuck’s giggling attempts to poke him back.

“Um. Why, though?” Mike adds. “I mean, if they're already, you know, both interested…”

“Chuck might be havin’ fun right now, but that doesn't mean he actually wants to deal with Texas, like, romantically or whatever,” Dutch says. “Guy can be really pushy, you know? And Chuck's not gonna put up with that in a relationship, even a casual one.”

Mike sighs and shakes his head. “Tex is such a sweet guy, it’s just funny how bad he is at showing it.”

“Real bad,” Dutch agrees. “I think he’d figure it out for Julie first, and he hasn’t, so…”

“He’s been really nice to _me_ ,” Mike says, turning back to the car, “but that’s kind of different. Maybe he's better at being just friends than he is at... you know, whatever.”

Dutch thinks the way Texas treats Mike is a lot more  _whatever_ than it is  _just friends_ , but he’s not going to tell Mike that. Or Texas, for that matter. 

The rest of the day is nice and relaxed. They work on their cars for a while and Dutch starts on a couple new specialty parts. Texas pesters him for glowy ink art of his own, but the discussion breaks down because Texas wants it all over his chest and Dutch isn’t sure it’s a good idea to get his hands all over a shirtless Texas right now. Even with Chuck around to take his hormones out on, that just feels like it’s asking for trouble.

Eventually the angry rumbling of Chuck’s stomach persuades them all to quit for dinner, and afterwards they play games until Mike goes kind of loopy with fatigue, grinning all half-lidded and sleepy and laughing a lot. It’s really, really cute.

Before Dutch gives in and hauls Chuck off to bed, he finally remembers to ask Mike, “Hey, Julie say how long she was goin’ for?”

“Oh, uh,” Mike says, blinking. “No? She was talking about a sleepover, earlier…”

“Aw, nice,” Dutch says, and grins encouragingly, since Mike looks a little uncertain. “She could probably use some girl time. That’s great. Everybody needs some downtime now and then, right?”

“Yeah,” Mike says, smiling back, and then yawns and looks startled.

“All right,” Chuck says, clapping his hands together, “that’s it, Mikey, bed.”

Dutch doesn’t even have to say anything, just catches Chuck’s eye and lifts an eyebrow and the poor dork goes bright red. It’s beautiful.

Mike doesn't even notice, though, just drops his head and laughs all sheepish before he says his goodnights and heads up to his room.

Another few days, Dutch tells himself. He can wait another couple of days before jumping Mike real good. Maybe he’ll team up with Chuck to do it.

In the meantime, they’ll work off their frustration on each other.

*

The next day is low-key again, hanging out with Mike, playing games and upgrading Blonde Thunder. Texas doesn’t quite follow at Mike’s heels wherever he goes, but he does stay pretty close, keeping watch for any signs of Nega-Burners in the vicinity. Dutch has to admit it’s very sweet.

Dutch wouldn’t let on if Chuck confronted him, but it’s just possible he’s been dropping the occasional suggestive comment into conversation when he talks with Mike, just kind of keeping him thinking about how appealing Chuck is, now that he knows sharing is a thing. So far the main effect it’s seemed to have is making Mike duck off kind of often for moments of private alone time, which Dutch can’t manage to feel guilty about, especially when Chuck catches his eye and drags him into the storage room once or twice after Mike vanishes. It’s _hot_ to know that thinking about it gets to Mike like that.

Texas gets sulky when Dutch and Chuck go off together, but the guy’s no good at holding a grudge, and now that Chuck is relaxed enough from all the sex to run around with him sometimes, he cheers up quick. Everyone is really cheerful, actually.

It’s so good to have Mike back, such a relief to let go of all the confusion and anxiety, Dutch thinks maybe they’re all a little giddy. The last while’s been so weird and stressful, with Mike out of it and Chuck forced to lead and Texas acting out, the whole team was kind of losing it, getting tense and mean with each other. Now they’re all friends again and Mike’s pretty much acting normal and it’s just… really great. They’re all focused on Mike, giving him as much positive reinforcement as they can manage, being friendly and supportive and affectionate, and some of the affection just ends up spilling over on each other.

It’s awesome. Too bad Julie’s missing out, but apparently when she decided she needed girl time, she meant a _lot_ of it, so it’s cool. She’s getting what she needs too, Dutch is all for that.

*

Julie’s not back by that evening, or lunch the next day. Mike has to keep reminding himself it’s okay, she’s coming back. He didn’t do anything to make her mad, and if he was being too needy and she needed a break from kind of taking care of him, that’s fine, she deserves one.

She probably wouldn’t put it that way, either. He thinks she’d put it more like, she helped fix most of the stuff that’d gone wrong with him, and thought he’d be fine on his own now. So he needs to relax and show that he can handle things, prove her right. He keeps telling himself that, but as the afternoon wears on and she doesn’t show up or even call to let them know how the visit’s going, he can’t fight down the worry anymore. What if she _is_ mad? What if she thinks he’s pathetic?

What if she’s not coming back?

In an effort to distract himself, Mike reorganizes one of the storage rooms with Texas keeping him company. He’s almost finished when Texas shifts his weight and huffs.

“Y’know, Tiny, this ain’t exactly the best time for Lisa to be like, out on the town this long. I mean, we got Nightmare Burners runnin’ around out there, and how’s Texas supposed to protect all you guys if you don’t stay put?”

Mike turns in surprise. “Are you worried about her, Tex?”

Texas crosses his arms defensively. “No! It’s just like, Texas is supposed to be watchin’ out for the Evil Ninja Nega guys, but she’s gotta be here for that to work, she can’t be missin’ like this.”

Mike swallows. “She’s not missing, Tex,” he says as firmly as he can, but having Texas share the concern Mike’s been fighting makes it stronger. It also makes it easier to deal with, because now he’s acting on behalf of his team instead of for himself.

“How about we call her up?” he suggests. “Just see how the visit’s going, find out if she has an idea when she’ll come on back. Yeah?”

Looking relieved, Texas nods vigorously. “Yeah! We gotta remind her to look out for those nightmare jerks! She's even having sleepovers, right? So it's _extra_ important she knows.”

Mike smiles. “All right, let’s go do that.”

He heads out into the garage, where Dutch and Chuck are working on something, and leans on Mutt as he raises a comm screen, with Texas pretending he's not fretting at his side. Mike takes a careful breath, planning what he’s going to say in case Julie’s annoyed to be interrupted, and opens a line to her.

Or tries. For some reason the call won’t go through. He tries twice more, fighting down the growing anxiety, and finally opens a line to Jacob.

It goes through, though it takes a moment for Jacob to answer. “Hey, what’s up? Should be back by the end of the week, you kids doing all right on food?”

Mike blinks, trying to remember what’s left in the freezer. “Yeah, we’re good,” he guesses. Okay, so the problem getting through to Julie isn’t an issue with Mike’s comms, and it’s not a range thing…

Texas leans in from the side. “Hey! How’s, uh, wherever you guys are?”

“Chicago’s fine, doing just fine,” Jacob said, “apart from all the fools that think they can beat me in a monster truck death match!”

“Heck yeah!” Texas says. “You show ‘em!”

“Oh, I have,” Jacob says smugly, “and I’m going to keep doing it.”

“Say hi to Hudson!” Texas says. "And ROTH!"

“Well, I will, as soon as they stop binge-watching the local soaps,” Jacob says, directing that last mostly over his shoulder. “You kids want anything in particular?”

“Just checking you guys are doing okay,” Mike says, pushing down the guilt that it’s not quite true. There’s no point in telling Jacob there might be some kind of problem when they don’t even know what it is and he’s in a whole different city, though.

Jacob smiles, stroking his mustache down. “Well, we’re doing just fine, Mike. You can tell the others. We’ll be back soon, all right? You kids holding down the fort okay?”

Mike opens his mouth, but doesn’t quite manage a _Yeah_. Texas jumps in instead. “Aw heck yeah, there was like these Evil Ninja Nega Burners, but Texas has been keepin' a real sharp eye out, and—”

“Well, that’s great, Texas,” Jacob jumps in hastily, “but I gotta go, the next round is up soon and I need to go keep an eye on the competition. You kids be good!” He waves and closes the line.

Texas shrugs and looks at Mike. “Okay, so _they’re_ fine. Maybe we don’t have to worry about Nega Burners botherin’ them all the way over there. Plus, like, what would Evil Jacob even do? Grow _grosser_ carrots? Pshh, lame.”

“Yeah,” Mike says, trying to smile at him. “I think you’re right, they're totally fine.” He licks his lips and tries again to get through to Julie, without success.

“Aw, did she turn her thing off?” Texas says, folding his arms and scowling at the blank screen. “Come on, Jenny, you gotta not do that!”

“Maybe,” Mike says doubtfully. It’s hard to think past the spinning, chattering anxiety filling his head, hard not to slide back into _I’m in trouble and they all hate me_ , but he forces it down and calls, “Hey, Chuck, can you get through to Julie?”

“Oh! Uhh,” Chuck says, pulling up a comm screen, “yeah, should be no, uh… huh. That’s weird. And you got through to Jacob fine, so…”

“Yeah, it’s just her,” Mike says, moving over to him.

“She knows better than to turn her comms off,” Chuck mutters. “What did you want to talk to her about?” he adds without much attention, boosting the call and trying it again.

“Oh, uh, just wanted to check in,” Mike says lamely. “Find out how things are going, see if she has an ETA for coming back. You know.”

“Right, yeah,” Chuck says, and Mike relaxes a little. Chuck doesn’t think that sounds dumb, he’s not mad, everything’s fine.

“Either she turned off her comms, or she’s somewhere the network is blocked,” Chuck says, nibbling on a thumbnail. “Which is weird. Maybe… we should try Claire?”

“Yeah!” Mike says, relieved that Chuck is also concerned enough to want to pursue it. “Yeah, good plan.” Buoyed by the support, he opens a line to Claire himself, Chuck hovering at one elbow, Texas at the other. Dutch is the only one still working.

Claire picks up before Mike has a chance to get any more tense. She’s in her Amazon bodysuit, her hair in two buns, and she blinks at Mike. “Um, hi?”

“Hey, Claire, sorry to interrupt,” he says, smiling. “Just calling to see how you guys are doing.”

“Oh!” She laughs a little, brows pulling together in puzzlement. “Fine, I guess? Things are, y’know, okay.”

That’s… not as enthusiastic as he expected. He’s trying to figure out how to ask if she and Julie had a disagreement or something when she says, “I guess you guys have been really busy the last few days, huh? Just totes run off your feet with bot attacks and stuff.”

Mike blinks. “Uh, no, actually,” he says, glancing at Chuck for confirmation. “It’s been really quiet.”

She stares at him, then huffs and crosses her arms. “So she doesn’t even have that excuse? _Super_ cool.”

“Who?” Mike asks.

“Uh, _Julie?_ ” Claire says pointedly. “I know you guys have this whole, like, protecting us all from her dad thing going on, but—”

“Are you guys fighting?” Chuck says, leaning in from the side. “What’s she need an excuse for?”

“Boy, don’t ask _me_ if we’re fighting,” Claire says, throwing up one delicate hand in exasperation, “I don’t even _know_ what’s going on with her! I guess she didn’t tell you guys, she was supposed to come see me a few days ago, we were gonna do our nails all fancy and race and stuff—”

“Wait,” Chuck says sharply as Mike stares at Claire, blood pounding in his ears. “Wait, she never showed up?!” Chuck’s voice goes high, but Mike is just distantly glad he’s still talking, because Mike can’t. He’s having trouble even breathing.

There’s a clatter from the workbench as Dutch drops whatever he was working on and comes over in three quick strides.

“She left like two days ago, we thought she was with you!” Chuck says to Claire.

“Oh my god,” Claire says, eyes round. Her hands come up to cover her mouth. “Oh my god, oh my god, _Jules_. Something must have happened.”

“Oh my god,” Chuck echoes, shoving a hand through his hair. “ _Shit_. Okay, look, we’ll call you back if we—wait. Can you talk to your sentries, find out if they’ve seen Nine Lives or anything suspicious?”

“Okay,” Claire says, and hugs herself worriedly. “For sure, yeah, and I’ll call you guys, okay?”

Chuck nods and the call winks out. Mike stares at the patch of air where the screen was and tries to get a full breath. His chest feels like it’s too small for his lungs to expand.

“Did the Nega dudes get her?” Texas says, shifting from one foot to the other as his fists clench and unclench.

“No,” Chuck says shortly, turning away to start pacing. “And there’s no way _Kane_ caught her,” he says. “We would’ve heard about it five minutes later, he’d be falling over himself to gloat at getting her back, maybe even trying to use her as leverage against us—”

“Chuck,” Dutch says as an involuntary distressed noise makes it out of Mike. Dutch puts a hand on his back. “Not helpin’, man. You okay?” he says to Mike.

“I—y-yeah,” Mike says numbly. Images hang behind his eyes, Nine Lives tearing along a road until it crumbles under the wheels, Julie falling or crushed or attacked and overwhelmed. She’s been missing for _two days_ already. She’s not coming back.

There’s a weird buzzing feeling under his skin and everything around him seems distant, moving along without him. His hands are fizzy and numb, his mouth dry. Julie’s gone. There’s nothing he can do but hope it doesn’t happen to the others, like in the dreams.

Maybe this is a dream. Maybe none of this is real, he’s been dreaming the whole time. That would be bad, the whole burr thing has been such a nice break from being a failure, but at least then he could wake up and Julie wouldn’t be dead.

"Mike, talk to us," Dutch says, leaning in close. Mike swallows hard, past the acid stickiness in his throat, the pounding building numbness in his temples, and drags in a long, burning breath. He wants to lean into Dutch's arms. He wants to  _run_ , get a head start before— before everyone—

“I shouldn’t have suggested she go visit,” he chokes out. “I shouldn’t have let her go off on her own, one of us should’ve gone with her—”

“Yeah, Julie would’ve loved that,” Dutch snorts. “Like she can’t take care of herself as well as any of us? And you did good tellin’ her to go take some time, come on, man, this isn’t your fault.”

“If I hadn’t told her to go,” Mike says helplessly, “she’d still be…” He can’t say it out loud. He’s such a coward. Such a failure. Can't keep it together, can't make the right calls, can't keep anyone safe. Everything falls apart again and again and  _again_ _—_

“What, here?” Dutch says. “Or okay? Man, we don’t know what happened, she might be fine, just… caught up or something.”

Chuck pulls up sharply in the middle of pacing. “Mike! No, she’s not—Julie’s not _dead!_ ”

“What?!” Dutch says, staring from Chuck to Mike. “No! Oh my god, man, is that what you’re thinkin’? There’s a ton of better explanations, jeez, don’t assume the worst possible thing is what’s goin’ on! Let’s just work on finding her right now. Okay?”

Mike manages a nod, but this feeling is too familiar, this clawing fear is too _certain_ : he knows what happens next and there’s no point pretending it’s all going to be okay. It’s not. Julie’s gone and whether or not they find her body, Dutch or Texas is going to go next, and then the others one by one until Mike is alone in the hideout and losing his mind. Unless they get him first, unless they agree with him, unless they wanna get even— god, he doesn't want this to be another one with the knives. It's so selfish but even being the last guy standing would be better than that again. 

“ _Mike_ ,” Chuck says, grabbing him by the shoulders, pulling him away from Dutch. Mike flinches, eyes squeezing shut despite himself, arms wrapped tight around around his gut, waiting for the blow to fall. 

“Hey, watch it!” Texas says.

“This isn’t like one of your nightmares, okay, this is _real,"_ Chuck says intently, and Mike shivers at that, nods fast. "Mike, _come on_! That means we don’t just automatically lose because the dream says so. We can’t just give up, we have to do this, Julie needs us!”

“Do _what?_ ” Mike says helplessly. When he forces his eyes open he sees that Chuck's shoved his back his bangs with one hand to meet Mike’s eyes, scared but determined. Scowling.  _Wrong answer, wrong question_ ,  _another bad call—_

Chuck’s hand tightens on his shoulder, shakes him a little. “ _Find_ _her!_ ”

Mike nods fast, eyes wide, now, and tries to keep breathing even though Chuck is loud and in his face and frustrated with him. “Okay! Got it, find her!”

“Hey,” Texas says, shouldering up next to them, “I _said_ , watch it! No yellin’ at Tiny, and no manhandling, that ain’t cool!”

“Oh, shit,” Chuck says, and lets go of Mike, stepping back fast. His shoulders hunch as he holds his hands up in front of himself. “Bro, I didn’t mean—I—”

“All three of you just try to chill out,” Dutch says, putting a careful hand on Mike’s shoulder, then stroking up and down his back. Mike shudders again, but then his breathing starts to ease, his chest loosening and expanding as he involuntarily relaxes under the gentle touch. He can't help but lean back into Dutch this time, blindly trying to ground himself, deal with the overwhelming fear however he can. Find Julie, keep it together. Find her. 

Chuck says, his voice shaking, “You think I’m not trying? Panicking is kind of my thing, Dutch!”

“Yeah well, you can’t _both_ do it,” Texas says. “And Mike’s doin’ that right now, so you gotta do some brainy nerd thing instead.”

“We need you on this,” Dutch tells Mike quietly as Chuck huffs at Texas. “The sooner we find out where she got to so we can help her, the better, and you’re the one who’s best at coordinating this stuff. We gotta help her out, man. You in?”

Mike takes a deep, shivery breath and nods. He’s right, they’re right. And Chuck is usually the one who freaks out about things and assumes the worst, so if even _he_ thinks Julie might be alive, they have to try to find her, help her. Mike can do that, last until then. 

“Great,” Dutch says with a relieved smile. “Okay, so what do we do first?”

Mike bites his lip. Before he got all messed up, this would’ve been easy; he wouldn’t have been worried about pissing his team off, wouldn’t have been second-guessing himself like this. Before, he didn’t understand so viscerally what it’s like to make the wrong call and have it destroy everything. He didn't have to pay for his mistakes over and  _over_ until he just got used to being a total failure, until he learned to give up before he even got started.

Right now, though, the wrong call is to not take action. He can’t run, he can't quit. He can't help Julie at all if he refuses to even think about the possibilities. She's still alive for now, everyone says so, there's still a chance. 

He breathes in. Bites his lip _hard_. Concentrates. “Texas, the Weekend Warriors share a border with the Amazons. Call up AJ and find out if they’ve seen Nine Lives—or Julie—in the last few days. Go over their patrol routes with them, if you can, so we can at least rule out where she wasn't. Claire should call me back as soon as she has an answer from the Amazons—”

“Should we check Nine Lives’ tracking beacon?” Chuck asks, and Mike snaps his fingers, points at him.

“Yes, go for it. Even if she’s not with her car anymore, it might give us a hint where she was headed.” He pauses, trying to think, and then realizes he doesn’t have to figure it all out himself. “Can you guys think of anything else?”

“We can call the other gangs if none of this turns up anything,” Texas says, "Like, the Skylarks have eyes all over the place, and Rayon totally still owes us for the thing with the killer cockroaches." 

"Yeah, great point," Mike agrees. "We've got options, we can expand the search if we have to— but for now let's concentrate on tracing her most likely routes." 

Texas gives him a showy salute, and Chuck nods, already bringing up screens. 

"Dutch, can you check over the cars, make sure nothing's been— I don't know, sabotaged?"

"Oh, dang, yeah," Dutch says. "Didn't even think of that, but maybe Kane, or Red— I'm on it."

He gives Mike a one-armed hug before he goes, though, bumps their foreheads together. "Good work, dude," he says, low and close. 

Mike manages a sheepish half-smile as the last of the clawing panic fades out. It still doesn’t really _feel_ like good work, it feels like he’s barely pulling his weight through the choking mess of what's been done to his head, his nerves, and the others are putting up with his pathetic crap just because they’re nice guys. But he’s been feeling like that for the last week, and they keep saying it’s not true, so he does his best to ignore it. He can keep going for them, keep hoping that this time everyone'll make it through.

“Okay,” he says, “let’s do this.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While the body horror tag has briefly come into play before, it's rather more prominent in this chapter. (Not that much _worse_ , just _more_.) Also notice the new tag for wound care. Feel free to ask Rollerskatinglizard on Tumblr if you need to know details before reading.

It turns out that the Weekend Warriors and the Amazons haven’t seen anything, but Chuck locates Nine Lives’ beacon right away, nothing’s blocking it like Mike was afraid there might be. It’s halfway to Amazon territory, and it’s just sitting there.

“All right,” Mike says, looking from Texas to Dutch to Chuck. “Let’s go check it out.”

Everyone nods and splits for their cars. Chuck heads straight for Mutt’s passenger seat, and it makes Mike feel a little better to see that he doesn’t even hesitate.

The drive out relaxes him just because it’s so _nice_ to be back in the driver’s seat, with Chuck in the right place, Mutt moving smoothly over the roads under Mike’s control, the Burners out on a mission. Mike knows how to do this, he’s _good_ at this. With his hands on the wheel, some of his old confidence comes back to him from when he was the leader and knew that made sense and that everyone approved.

They reach the signal Nine Lives’ beacon is putting out and Mike pulls Mutt to a halt a good ten yards back from where Nine Lives is stopped, just in case. His stomach sinks as soon as he gets out of the car, because Nine Lives’ driver’s side door is open and nothing’s moving inside or anywhere in view.

He heads closer, one hand clutching the cool reassuring shape of the chrome skull in his pocket, Chuck falling in at his side as Dutch and Texas follow them.

“Hey, Jules?” Mike calls, one last bid for hope. He half expects something to come out of the shadows and attack, but there’s no response at all.

He reaches the car, and the driver’s seat is empty. He knew, by now, he knew she wasn’t here, she really was gone, but he still stands there staring into the abandoned car for a long while, kind of blank, buzzing under his skin and feeling weirdly far away and much too present at the same time. Like his whole body aches, like existing hurts right now.

Chuck pushes past him with a quiet groan, starts examining the interior, pulls up Julie’s screens and flips through them. Texas shifts from foot to foot and doesn’t say anything. Dutch looks around the whole area, comes back and reports in frustration that he didn’t notice anything weird.

Mike just stands there, drifting. Julie’s gone.

*

“You find anything, man?” Dutch asks Chuck, who’s still sitting in Nine Lives glaring at the screens like he can intimidate them into giving up Julie’s location.

“Not a thing,” Chuck snaps. “No logged calls before she got out of the car, nothing since she left the garage that day. There’s nothing _here_.” He’s getting kind of loud, and Dutch automatically looks to Mike to check if he’s still okay with the raised voice.

Mike’s eyes have that glazed, distant look to them, like they did back at the hideout after finding out Julie was missing, and he’s standing kind of still and listless. Crap, he’s checked out again.

“Mike,” Dutch says. “Come on, man, we gotta keep our heads on straight, we can’t give up on this.”

Mike looks up at Dutch, eyes still hazy but—maybe a little more present. His face tightens with distress and he ducks his head, runs a hand through his hair.

“Come on, Tiny!” Texas says, coming over. “You’re the leader, little guy, that means you gotta lead! What do we do now, huh?” He slaps Mike on the back, and maybe he’s anxious and distracted enough that he forgot to pull it, or maybe Mike just wasn’t ready for it, but Mike staggers under the impact. He stumbles forward a step and whips around with his hands up and his back to Nine Lives, eyes huge, chest rising and falling way too fast.

“Dang it, Texas!” Dutch snaps.

“Hey, no, Tiny,” Texas starts, looking almost as upset as Mike. “Come on, no, Texas isn’t gonna—” He’s stepping in closer, the idiot, trying to get a hand on Mike’s shoulder when the last thing the guy needs right now is to be crowded.

Dutch grabs Texas’s shoulder and hauls, and surprise is enough to get him to stumble a step away. “Back _off_ , you dumbass!”

“Mikey?” Chuck says, scrambling out of the car and coming forward cautiously. Mike looks wildly from him to Dutch and Texas and makes a tiny high noise at the back of his throat that twists at Dutch’s heart. He thinks he’s surrounded, god. Dutch wants to burn the Terras to the ground for doing this to him. Not an option at the moment, though, so he settles for standing there watching as Chuck edges closer to Mike, talking soothingly.

“Come on, bro, let’s go over to Mutt and get you a little space.”

It takes Mike a minute, but then he turns and heads back to his car, striding so long and quick he’s half-running. Chuck follows him, and Texas follows on Chuck’s heels.

Rolling his eyes, Dutch goes after him. “Texas, this is not the time—”

“Texas _wasn’t gonna hurt him!_ ” Texas says, ignoring Dutch and catching up with Chuck—and Texas’s voice is always gruff, but right now it sounds rougher than usual, almost hoarse.

“Texas, back off,” Chuck says, high and exasperated, and puts out a hand to gently touch Mike’s arm as he leans on the driver’s side door. Mike’s eyes are still way too wide, fixed on the other Burners, and he’s kind of huddled back against the car, breathing hard.

“Hey bro,” Chuck says. He’s being careful to stay most of an arm’s length away and stand beside instead of in front of him, give him room and not box him in. “Mikey, slow down, breathe—”

“Mike, it’s _me_ , it’s _good_ Texas,” Texas says, shouldering past Chuck, and Mike cringes back, pretty much hyperventilating, and Texas’s voice is cracking but he’s not paying attention, he’s not _listening_. “You don’t gotta look like that, I wouldn’t do _nothin’_ —”

“ _Texas_ —” Dutch starts, but Chuck has had enough.

“Back _off!_ ” he snarls, plants both hands on Texas’s broad chest and _shoves_. Taken completely by surprise, Texas stumbles backwards, mouth open. His face is just darkening with anger when Chuck steps between him and Mike, jaw set.

“Weren't you _just_ on me about this? No yelling, no grabbing,” Chuck says in a hard voice, drawing himself up to his full height, shoulders back, hands in fists. “This can't be about how  _we_ feelright now. Get a grip!” He turns back to Mike before Texas can decide how to react.

Besides being shocked, which is obvious on his face. Dutch sympathizes, and also wonders if it’s weird that he’s really kind of turned on right now. _Dang_ Chuck is hot when he’s being protective.

Chuck speaks quietly to Mike, who at least is only looking at him now, eyes still wide but maybe slightly less terrified. Maybe it got through that Chuck put himself between Mike and the apparent threat.

Texas is staring at Chuck’s back, hands balled into fists, jaw clenched.

“Texas,” Dutch says quietly, “c’mere a minute.” He waits long enough to be sure Texas is following and leads the way over to Whiptail, a few yards back. He perches on one front tire and Texas leans up against the side with his head down.

“Wasn’t gonna hurt him,” he mutters, pulling his hat off and running a hand over his slicked back hair.

“I know that, man,” Dutch says quietly. “And Chuck knows that, and Mike knows that except when he gets stuck in his head like this. It doesn’t matter that—it’s—” that it’s not real, no, don’t get into that stuff, god, how does he talk about this with _Texas?_ Stick to the basics. “—You can’t get pushy about all this stuff, okay? Just… let Chuck talk him down, and he’ll remember that you’re not gonna hurt him, and it’ll be fine. Think you can do that?”

“Yeah,” Texas mumbles, and scrubs his sleeve over his eyes.

Oh, geez. Now Dutch feels bad for _him_ , too. It’s not like the guy has any clue how to deal with his _own_ emotions, it’s no wonder he fumbles other people’s.

Glancing over at Mutt, Dutch sees Mike’s head bent close to Chuck’s, which seems like a good sign. Chuck’s helping, Mike’s gonna be okay, in a minute they can talk about where to go from here.

Texas sniffs damply. “I really _wouldn’t_ hurt him,” he says. “Not ever. He’s my _friend._ ”

Dutch gives in. “Hey,” he says, kind of gentle, hoping he doesn’t sound too awkward. “You want—” no, that’s not the way to put it, is it, not for a macho guy like Texas. “You’re my friend too, so can I get a hug?”

Texas hesitates a minute before striding over and wrapping his arms forcefully around Dutch. Dutch huffs a little, air pushed out of him, and hugs back.

“What’sa matter,” Texas says, not quite back to his usual brash tone but trying, “you all worried and junk?”

“Well, _yeah_ ,” Dutch says, snorting. “Things are gettin’ pretty freaky here. It’d be weird if we _weren’t_ all worried at this point.”

Texas sighs and holds on a minute longer before he lets go. They go back to waiting quietly for Chuck to get Mike sorted out.

It feels like a long time later, though Dutch is pretty sure it’s only like ten minutes, when Mike steps around Mutt and comes over with Chuck behind him.

He looks better, still tense and drawn but not out of it, not lost in the leftover nightmares anymore. His eyes flick from Texas to Dutch as he comes up, and he gives them a strained smile.

“Hey. Sorry. Um, we need to get Nine Lives back to the garage, and it makes sense to regroup, think about where else we can look for leads. So, Tex, can you hook up your tow line? And be careful with Julie’s ride, or she’ll kick all our butts when she gets back.”

“Yeah, Texas is on it!” Texas says, as Dutch smiles in sheer relief to have Mike back, again, and talking like of _course_ Julie’s okay. Mike is supposed to be optimistic, it was bizarre to have him jumping to the worst case scenario like that.

“Yeah,” Dutch adds to Texas, “don’t scratch that paint or you know she’ll take it out of your hide.”

Texas huffs at him, takes a step toward Stronghorn and stops. “Uh,” he says, turning back to Mike. “…Hey. Uh. Sorry. Texas didn’t mean to make it worse, but like—you _know_ I’m Good Guy Texas now, right?” he bursts out.

Mike bites his lip and nods. “I know, Tex. I—I just—”

“No, I know,” Texas says with a grimace. “Nega-Texas is still around bein’ a _jerk_ and I can’t _punch him!_ ” He rolls his shoulders, scowling, then looks up and nods at Mike. “It’s okay though, Tiny, we’ll get him. You'll be alright.” His eyes flicker over to Chuck for a second and Dutch could swear he looks uncertain before he turns away and strides over to Stronghorn.

“Texas just apologized,” Chuck mutters to Dutch. “And he didn’t even get all sulky and turn it into someone else’s fault. I mean, except for his evil twin's.”

“Well, it is _Mike_ ,” Dutch points out, to be fair.

“Yeah, good point,” Chuck says.

Mike hunches his shoulders, shifting restlessly as Stronghorn rumbles to life. “Guys… come on, can we not?”

“Right, we gotta get going,” Chuck says. Stronghorn tears past, coming to a halt just in front of Nine Lives and Texas gets back out to start hooking her up to tow.

“See you guys back there,” Dutch says, and gets into Whiptail.

*

As they pull up, there’s a weird, small shadow hunched up against the front gate of the hideout: it flickers and hunches up in the crossing beams of their headlights, bony forelimbs coming up to shield what might be its head.

“Is that…?” Chuck asks over comms.

“Julie, it’s Julie!” Texas yells. Dutch whoops with delight and throws Whiptail into park, then pops the windshield and scrambles out.

Mike’s already thrown himself out of Mutt and is striding forward, one of his hands held up to keep the rest of them back. There’s something really horrible about the little shadow, the way it’s huddled into itself. The way it presses against the metal blast doors, cringing.

“Jules…?” Mike asks, very softly. He’s hunched up, himself, moving slow and careful the last couple steps. “Hey, hey. Jules, it’s me.”

“…I gotta get to the Burners,” the ragged shadow mumbles. “Gotta. Um.” The front part twists around uncertainly, and Dutch can see— it’s a hood, some kind of makeshift cloak. There’s a wet glitter inside it, he can’t tell what’s going on more than that, with all the headlight glare.

“Can we get her inside?” he asks.

“Yeah, hold on,” Mike says. He reaches his hand out really slowly and cups the back of the hood, draws the little figure closer, step by stumbling step.

“No, no, no,” it mumbles. “I gotta go. Let go, I gotta go, lemme go, I gotta find the Burners.”

“You found us, Jules. We’re here, you made it home.”

“… _Home_ ,” it— she— says, an exhausted, longing moan, and leans against Mike’s chest. Mike smooths the hood back and— yeah, that’s Julie, and she looks like absolute hell.

Texas is at Dutch’s elbow, now, shifting from foot to foot, twisting his cap between his fists.

“What happened to her?” he whispers fiercely. “Who did this?”

“We’re gonna find out, man,” Dutch says, patting his back. “Just keep it cool.”

“Texas is so chill he makes ice look like it’s not even tryin’,” Texas shoots back, absently. Mike is stroking the back of Julie’s head, looking pretty much gutted, and Julie is… probably crying? Dutch never thought to imagine what Julie would look like if she cried so he’s not completely sure what he’s looking at right now, but it’s nasty, and he hates it.

“Can we get the doors open without spooking her?” Chuck asks. “I mean, she’s— she’s really messed up. I think she’s messed up like Mike was.”

“The Terras?”

“Yeah, unless there’s _more_ guys out there that like to totally screw with our heads,” Chuck says. He summons up a few screens, examines them thoughtfully. “Dutch, you were working on the entrance protocols last, right?”

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s get it all open slow and smooth.” Dutch leans in and selects the menu options for the blast doors, sets them rolling open just a little at a time. Julie still jumps when light from inside spills across them, moans and tries to wriggle backwards out of Mike’s grip.

“Easy! Hey, hey, easy,” Mike says. “Come on, Jules, you’re home, you made it, come inside.”

Julie stares around at all of them, her eyes dark and deeply bruised all around the sockets.

“Guys…?” she says uncertainly. Her voice cracks.

“Yeah, it’s us,” Chuck says.

“We’ll keep you safe now,” Texas says, urgently, pushing forward. “It’s okay now, Julie, we all got your back, you can chill, we just gotta go inside.”

Julie shrinks back against Mike, burying her face in his chest, and Dutch is pretty sure he can hear Texas’s heart break from like six feet away. But he doesn’t say anything, just stands there, clenching and unclenching his fists, and looks intently at Mike.

Mike nods at him and picks Julie up, very carefully, an arm under her thighs and another around her shoulders, so she can keep her face hidden against his chest. She looks like a little kid, like this, she looks tiny. It’s one thing to _know_ Julie’s the smallest of all of them and it’s another, way more awful thing to actually have to see it.

Dutch eases all the doors open quietly, no beeps or clanks or fanfares, and they all follow Mike in on foot, like some kind of messed up, freaking-out honor guard. Even in better lighting, it’s hard to tell what’s up with Julie, how badly she’s injured: she’s got a big, filthy stretch of dark fabric bundled around her, a tarp or a tablecloth or something, and it hides almost everything. It must have worked great for camouflage, on her trip from wherever she was back to base. One of her hands sneaks out of it just enough to pull her hood back up, and Dutch’s heart twinges painfully at the glimpse of raw, torn-up knuckles, of layers and layers of dirt and blood.

Mike takes her up to the diner landing, sets her on the edge of the table. She sits upright without help, though her head hangs tiredly.

“Can I take this off?” Mike asks her, and tugs lightly at the cloak thing.

“‘M hiding,” she mumbles. “Can’t— can’t let them— can’t— I can’t, I can’t, I _can’t_ —”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Mike says, and starts pulling the fabric off her anyway. “You’re home now, you’re safe. You don’t have to hide, okay?”

“No no no— NO! _NO!_ ” Julie lashes out at him, scratching at his face, her own face wild with terror and a weird fury.

“Oh god, her arms,” Chuck says. They’re covered in long, dark cuts and gouges.

“ _Jules_ ,” Mike says, and catches both her wrists. “Jules, this is _real_. You’re _awake_. You can _stop._ ”

Julie freezes, in his hold, then slowly goes limp. “…Real?” she asks.

“It’s real, you’re awake,” he says. “You made it.”

“Real,” she repeats, turning the word over in her mouth. All her lipstick’s gone, but some screwed-up combination of a bloody nose and a scratch at her temple has left plenty of wet, red smears over her face anyway. Dutch wants to kill all the Terras in the world and salt their corpses. He wants to scream.

As suddenly as she’d lashed out in defense of her cloak thing, Julie strips it off, a flurry of thin arms and dirty fingers. She’s just got her t-shirt on underneath, and she— whoa, okay, she strips that off too. Chuck makes an uncomfortable noise and looks up at the ceiling, and even Mike looks away, like a dork, but Julie keeps—she keeps clawing, scratching at her skin like she wants it off, and that’s apparently what’s happened to her arms and maybe even her face, holy shit.

“Get them off, get them all off,” Julie begs them, twisting to scrabble at her back, head craning over her shoulder. “Get them off, guys, please, I can’t, I _can’t_!”

“Oh, fuck,” Dutch says, and Mike doesn’t even wince at the language. He’s too busy staring in horror at the line of green burrs that have just come into view marching down Julie’s spine, crusted with blood where she’s tried to pull them out herself and failed. As they watch she digs her nails into one of the burrs and tries to lever it free, moaning with pain as more blood wells up, only for it to slip out of her grasp and root itself back down into her. Dutch can see a couple of the burrs are crooked, half an inch or so to the left or right of her spine, where she must have pulled them almost free before they dug in again.

“I’m gonna, uh,” Texas says, “ _nghk,”_ and he dashes hastily for the sink behind the bar. He barfs noisily and Dutch has to swallow kind of hard, because even if he wants to join Texas in horking every single one of his guts up, Julie needs them right now, as many of them as can keep it together.

“Chuck, get whatever tools you think would work,” Mike says steadily. “Dutch, get soap and water and stuff.” His voice is flat-calm, worryingly calm, but at least he’s not freaking out.

“Right,” Chuck says, sounding relieved, and Dutch nods and goes, pretty much running to get away from all that horror. Get some stuff to _fix_ it.

When he gets back, Julie’s stretched out flat on the table, stomach-down, and Texas is sitting in the far curve of the booth, holding both her hands. He’s telling her some kind of story, one of his goofy self-insert tall tales, but she’s staring up at him intently, nodding now and then. Not smiling or anything, but awake. Maybe tracking. Mike’s in the kitchen, putting together a smoothie.

Dutch has a bucket of warm, soapy water and a fresh sponge, and it feels pretty dumb to just have like the setup for washing a car when it’s _Julie_ , like he doesn’t care enough. It doesn’t feel right, but they need to clean her hands and back and stuff and he couldn’t think of what else to do. He’s got a washcloth too, and disinfectant, and a roll of gauze, so there’s that at least.

Texas doesn’t think there’s anything weird about the bucket, at least. He just takes the sponge, wrings it out in a practiced motion, and starts wiping down one of her hands. It looks ridiculously delicate against his broad palm, but at least, after all the grime and old blood is rinsed away, it doesn’t look so mangled. Just a couple split knuckles, and some bruising.

“Anything broken?” Dutch asks. He takes her other hand.

“Don’t think so,” Texas says. “She’s tough, y’know.”

“I know,” Dutch says.

Texas wrinkles his nose, like he’s not convinced. “So why’re you lookin’ like that, huh? This is nothin’! Our Betsy’s gonna be back on her feet in no time, she’s _fine_. Ain’t no one out there that can knock her out, and that is a _guaranteed Texas FACT!_ ”

Julie flinches at the volume, makes a weird squeaky whimper and hides her face against one of her thin, dirty shoulders. Texas looks stricken for a moment, then determined, and starts cleaning up her arms with even more painstaking gentleness.

“Right,” Dutch says, and takes a deep breath. “It’s gonna be okay. Can’t argue with the Texas Facts.”

Mike comes back with the smoothie, slides into the booth to sit by Texas, and touches her shoulder to get her attention.

“Hey, Jules,” he says. “Hey, you with us?”

“No,” she says. “I don’t know. I don’t— I gotta— I don’t _know_ , I don’t know _anything_ —”

“You’re with us,” he says firmly. “I need you to keep it together, okay? Here, I brought you a drink.”

“Poison.”

“Nope. Just a smoothie. Strawberry, and, um, grapes and stuff. Kale.”

Julie laughs scratchily. “Kale? Yeah, that’s. Um. Poison.”

Mike smiles. “You caught me. Come on, get this down. You gotta eat stuff in the real world.”

Julie nods and sits up, unsteady, and Dutch is reaching out to steady her before he realizes, whoops, that’s… that’s boobs, right at face level, um. Yep. That is definitely a pair of boobs right in everyone’s face. Man, Julie’s even whiter than Chuck, paper-pale with networks of fine blue veins like a vintage road map, that’s _cool_ and also he shouldn’t be staring even if it _is_ totally fascinating. Artistically speaking. He busies himself with wringing his sponge out and checking if the water in the bucket’s gotten too gross. Texas helps.

Mike keeps talking to her, joking very gently, and Dutch can’t really imagine how tough you have to be to go through crazy nightmare plant hell and come out the other side still willing to try and laugh about stuff, but, damn. If anyone was gonna be able to, it’d be Mike and Julie.

“You’re doing great,” Mike says finally, taking the empty cup away and helping her lie back down. “We’re gonna clean off your back and get the burrs out, now. Chuck’s got tweezers.”

Julie shudders all over, nods a few times. She’s weeping again, tears dripping slow through the dirt on her face, and Texas scowls. He wrings a sponge out again and sees to her face, holding her chin carefully and then wiping every bit of grime and blood away. Julie looks weird without any makeup, older and younger at once, somehow.

“You’re not gonna let this get you down,” Texas says firmly. He wipes at her tears again. “I know you.”

She gives him a small, shaking smile, and one of her hands creeps forward to rest in the crook of his elbow. He grins at her, really wide but just as shaky, and presses a kiss to her forehead.

“‘Kay, this is probably gonna feel lame, all this junk with your back,” he says. “But you can deal, no problem.”

Dutch leans over her back, wipes away the layers and layers of crusted blood and— hopefully just lymph, not infected pus or— or sap? _Ugh_ — he cleans her up as fast as he can without hurting her too much, eager to move on to actually fixing her, and sits back with a relieved sigh when her skin’s clear. Just that shockingly pale milk-white with a dozen different shades of pink and purple bruises and abrasions, and then the hateful green oblongs of the burrs.

“Chuck, you’re up, man,” he says. Julie shudders again, whimpers urgently. Texas pets at her tangled hair, clumsily, gathering it all up into a twisted rope over one of her shoulders, out of the way.

“Okay,” Chuck says, nervously. “O-okay, right. We’re just gonna do this. Um. Fast.”

“You got this, Chuckles,” Mike says. “It’ll be a cakewalk.”

“Some cake,” Chuck mutters. “Okay.” He moves in, sets the tweezers to the first burr, and pulls it free, smooth and steady so the long tendrils slide out unbroken. Blood wells up and Mike moves in with disinfectant and a sticky bandage already prepared, squirting disinfectant into the cluster of root holes to flush them out, swabbing them clean, then smoothing the bandage down. Chuck nods at him and he nods back, getting another bandage ready, and Chuck goes after the second burr.

Julie’s quiet, surprisingly enough. She swallows hard, pants raggedly with pain, but after all her disturbing whimpering and moaning up till now, she doesn’t make a sound.

Chuck makes a small, unhappy groan when he gets to the first displaced burr. The flat oblong of the thing is sort of rumpled up and the area where it _should_ have been is all puffy and infected-looking.

“Mike, I think there’s still roots in there?” he says unsteadily. “Like, broken off.”

“Get it out,” Julie hisses. “Get it all OUT, GET IT OUT, CHUCK GET IT OUT _NOW_ —”

“Shh, shssh, Julie, it’s okay,” Texas says, petting awkwardly at her hair, cupping her cheek. She bites one of his fingers, hard, and he winces. “Okay, that’s okay too, you just go ahead with that. No problem. Chuck’s on it, y’know, he’s got… like, supertweezers. Fastest tweezers in Motorcity. He’s… oh, man. Yuck. Yeah, he’s gettin’ it out. That is— so nasty—” Texas swallows hard and looks away.

“Yep, looks like he cleared all the root bits for that one,” Dutch says, cutting in for Texas, who really does not need to hurl again at this point. “Smooth sailing for another… hm, three burrs, then there’s another messed up one. You really fought hard to get these clear, girl.”

“Had to come back,” Julie mumbles. Texas takes a sharp breath as she lets him go, then pretends like it didn’t hurt at all, even though there’s a sharp pink crescent on the side of his index finger now. Julie goes on, “Had to get— the Burners, home, had to fight, had to run, hide, get _free_.”

“You’re free, now,” Mike says. He squirts extra disinfectant into the nasty torn-up patch of her spine, making sure it’s flushed out. “You’re free, this is real.”

Julie nods tightly, barely a twitch of her jaw, and goes back to tense stillness. She doesn’t make any more noise as Chuck and Mike work their way down to the end of the burrs, but Dutch goes on narrating for her anyway, and Texas keeps petting her hair.

Finally Chuck levers the last burr out and Mike lays down the last bandage. Chuck gives an explosive sigh, which makes Julie start up off the table and Texas bristle protectively, grabbing for her. Chuck cringes back and Julie sort of… slumps over exhaustedly on Texas, arms around his neck, and Dutch shares a helpless, unhappy look with Mike, everyone tired and stressed and wondering what next.

“I don’t think we should leave her alone,” Mike says quietly. Julie makes another of those horrible, broken little whimpers, and clings tightly to Texas, shaking her head against his shoulder.

“No, no no no, gotta— I need— Burners, the guys, I need to get _home_ ,” she moans. Texas looks like he’d fight the world one-handed for her, so Dutch thinks they probably don’t actually have any _say_ in leaving her alone. Texas would be a lot harder to peel off her than a burr.

“Might as well have another movie marathon,” Chuck says, scratching his jaw, and then goes a little pink when Mike and Dutch glance at him. “I mean, we could, uh— we could skip the back rubs this time? But, like, I think being close. Would be good. Therapeutically speaking, that is.”

“It helped me a lot,” Mike says, quiet and sincere. Dutch feels heat bloom in his own face, remembering Mike under his hands— and Chuck grinding in his lap under Mike’s hands— and Texas’s solid weight and the way he looked all sweet and relaxed in sleep.

“Yeah, good call,” Dutch says. “We can switch off sleeping and keeping watch, so she knows she’s safe.”

“Hear that, Julie?” Texas says softly, rubbing his jaw against her knotted hair. “You’re _safe_ , girl. You made it and you’re safe and we gotcha.”

“Burners,” she murmurs, and sort of… rubs her face against his neck, like a cat, nuzzling. She gives a long, hitching sigh, stretches, and goes limp. Texas kind of wibbles.

“Aww,” Dutch says, because he can’t help it. Because: _aww_.

Texas slides carefully out of the booth and gathers Julie up in his arms, then goes to carry her off to the rec room. Dutch goes to pick up her discarded shirt, but winces as soon as he touches it: it’s crusted with blood and sweat and garbage muck, it’s _nasty_. It smells worse than he thought it was possible for a girl to smell, and he’s been in sixteen-hour engineering jams with Tennie.

“We need to get her some fresh digs—do you know the passcode for her bedroom?” he asks Mike.

Mike’s shoulders go up around his ears.

“How would I know that?” he asks, surprisingly defensive.

Dutch blinks. “Okay, uh, fair point. I’ll go see if Tennie’s left anything in my room. Otherwise Julie’s just gonna have to wear like… A _really_ big shirt.”

“Wait, hold on, you and Tennie did it _here?”_ Chuck asks. “Like in the base, our base, _here_.”

“Hey, that’s confidential!” Dutch says.

“You sneaky jerk,” Chuck says admiringly. Dutch shoots fingerguns at him, grinning, and Chuck brushes at his bangs, grinning back, and they both become mutually aware of Mike staring fixedly away, cheeks rosy. Dutch jerks his head towards Mike, mouthing _you deal with this_ and Chuck rolls his eyes at him.

“See you in the rec room,” Chuck says. “ _Jerk_.”

“Love you too,” Dutch drawls, and then has a moment of complete and total panic that he _said that_ , and then leaves really fast.


	9. Chapter 9

Mike’s face is way too hot and he’s like, way too aware of his tongue. How he licked his lips without thinking about it at first, and now he just doesn’t know what to do with it, or his hands, or his eyes. Julie’s all torn up like he was, and he’s still pretty weird in the head himself, and he should be working out some kind of… plan, being a leader, but instead he’s hung up on Dutch’s wide, sweetly embarrassed grin, and the breathy quiet laugh Chuck made when the artist high-tailed it out of the room.

 _Love you too_.

Like it’s something people can just say to each other, just like that, even if it makes them shy right afterwards. It’s something people say to _Chuck_ , who was Mike’s friend first, anyway, for all that matters. They say that to Chuck and kiss him a lot and make him _smile_ like that.

Mike licks his lips again, and shoves his hands in his pockets. Julie’s still messed up. He’s gotta get his head together.

He follows Chuck down the stairs and through the hallways, not really trusting himself to say anything worthwhile, until Chuck finally sighs and slows down so much that Mike kind of _has_ to walk beside him.

“Hey,” Chuck says, and puts one of his arms around Mike’s shoulders. “You holding up okay, man?”

Mike smiles weakly. “I think that’s my line, dude,” he says. He wants to take his hand out of his pocket enough to put his arm around Chuck’s back, but feels weird about it. He didn’t _used_ to feel weird about it, but. It’s just one more thing the burr messed up, he figures. But he doesn’t know if that means he should do it anyway, or what.

Chuck’s arm tightens on his shoulders, and it’s really comforting.

“You tell me and I’ll tell you, how about,” he says.

“I’m okay,” Mike says.

“Bull,” Chuck says, and Mike sighs. Yeah, it is bull, but it’s easier to say than have to think about how he really is, and then say it out loud.

“I’m scared,” he admits. “Everything’s so messed up, Chuck, I’m— I don’t know what to _do_.”

“You’re doing alright so far,” Chuck says. “So just keep doing that.”

“Okay. Okay, cool.” Hearing it helps more than Mike thinks it probably should. He takes a deep breath, lets it out, lets his head tilt against the warm weight of Chuck’s arm. “So…”

“I’m okay,” Chuck says. Mike gives him a flat look up through his own bangs.

“That’s not just bull, that’s a whole pack of ‘em,” Mike says.

“I think it’s a team?” Chuck says. “A team of bulls.”

“Whatever it is, you’re it. What’s going on with you, dude? We can’t have like, _three_ headcases running around here. You gotta let me know if—”

“I’m mad,” Chuck says. “I’m just—” his arm tightens on Mike, then lets go abruptly, “I’m _so mad_ , Mikey, like first they got you and it was awful and we didn’t even _know_ and now even though we _did—_ I should have _known_ —”

Chuck runs both hands through his hair, struggling for composure, then turns sharply on his heel and rams his fist into the wall.

“Jeez! Chuckles!” Mike yelps, and grabs for him.

“I wanna _tear them APART_ ,” Chuck growls, and Mike remembers his best friend with red eyes, standing above him, and wraps his arms firmly around Chuck, drawing him close.

“Everything they did to you and Jules, I wanna make ‘em pay,” Chuck says fiercely, even as he presses his face into Mike’s collar. “I’m so mad, Mikey, I could kill them for this. I hate them so much. Like I should be scared it’s gonna happen to me or something but I’m not, I’m just. I’m.”

There’s itching heat against Mike’s neck, now, wetness, and he runs his hands up and down the long thin stretch of Chuck’s spine. Chuck is shaking, his chest hitching and stuttering as he tries to swallow back tears.

“Even Kane didn’t screw you two up this bad,” Chuck finally mumbles. “Even _Kane_. The way you looked at us…” He’s squeezing and bunching up the back of Mike’s jacket as he clings, like he thinks Mike might try to pull back.

Mike swallows, keeps stroking Chuck’s back. “Yeah,” he says steadily, “but I got better. I'm okay now, and she'll be okay too, she'll beat this thing.”

“She shouldn't have to!” Chuck snaps, his voice cracking as he veers back into fury. “Neither of you should have to deal with this crap!” One of his hands lets go of Mike’s jacket and slides over Mike’s spine, and… Stops right over where the burr was. Holding, protecting. Possessive, _oh_. Oh, man.

“They shouldn't have dared _touch_ you,” Chuck says, low and venomous, “and they are going to learn why we’re called the Burners. There’s not gonna be one stupid _leaf_ left standing by the time I’m done with ‘em.”

Mike's eyes widen and he's suddenly having trouble catching his breath. That's—different. He's not really used to Chuck getting all protective over him, or sounding that sure of himself outside a LARP session, and it's—good. Kind of… impressive. Mike might need a minute, geez, his cheeks are all hot and he's very aware of how close they're standing.

Chuck pulls back just enough to look at Mike, wet eyes narrow and fierce behind his bangs, hand still firm over that spot on Mike's back. Mike stares back, dry-mouthed. Their faces are really close and Chuck’s lips are a little chapped, flushed from being chewed on, and Mike kind of wants—

He wants to—

Chuck ducks his head, pulls his hands away to scrub over his face, dry his eyes. “Sorry, that's— I’m being weird,” he mutters, and spins hastily to start walking again. “Let's just...”

“No, you're—hey,” Mike hurries to fall in step, catches his elbow. “Chuckles, that's not— _I_ didn't think it was weird,” he says awkwardly, as they reach the end of the hall. “Uh, kind of intense, but. Cool.” He's pretty sure _he's_ the one who's being weird here, wanting to kiss people he really shouldn't. Especially his best friend, who's already got someone (but they're sharing, doesn't that mean Mike could—no. No. He's not doing that, it'd only mess everything up).

Chuck searches his face uncertainly, then relaxes slightly. He gives Mike a crooked smile, and Mike smiles back.

Dutch is already in the rec room, and he and Texas are just helping Julie into a clean shirt. White, definitely one of Tennie's, but at least it fits better than any of Mike's would have. 

“Hey,” Dutch says, looking up as Mike and Chuck come in. “Chuck, you wanna pick out the movie?”

“Yeah, sure,” Chuck says, and starts to set something up to watch while Mike goes over to join them on the couch. Julie is dressed now, but she doesn't seem to want to let go of Texas. Texas doesn't seem to mind, although he gives Mike a cautious glance when Mike sits down on her other side. Doing his best at a reassuring smile in return, Mike gently sets a hand on Julie’s shoulder.

“Hey, Jules,” he says as she twitches, then slowly relaxes again, clinging to Texas. Her hair isn't the usual shining fall, it twists and clumps together in visible tangles, spread over her shoulders and back. Now that she's clean and dressed again, it's kind of the first thing you notice.

…Aside from the way she's acting, obviously.

Mike picks up a lock of her hair and tries to untangle it without hurting her, but he's not really sure what he's doing.

“Hmm,” Dutch says from Mike’s other side. “That's a good plan, but I think we're gonna need the right tools. Hang tight, I'll be right back. Don't start the movie without me!”

Mike blinks at his back and stubbornly keeps trying to unpick the tangles with his fingers.

“Dude, are you trying to make that knot tighter?” Chuck says doubtfully, dropping onto the couch where Dutch was and leaning over Mike’s shoulder. Mike huffs and elbows him.

“I'm trying to _fix_ it.” His voice comes out a little more strained than he meant, and Chuck sighs.

“Mikey, just like you said, she's gonna be okay.”

“I know,” Mike mumbles, and Chuck hooks his chin over Mike’s shoulder and pats his arm.

“Yeah, Tiny,” Texas says, “she's gonna be fine! Cuz she's got _Tex_ —” he catches himself as Julie flinches at the loud noise, pats her very gently, grimacing. “She's got Texas here to fight off the Nega-Burners!” he finishes in a no-less-fierce undertone.

Mike frowns, fingers going still on the knot in her hair. “I'm not sure she was dealing with Nega-Burners, Tex. Seemed like the Terras were using some other angle with her.”

“Yeah? Well, whatever,” Texas says. “Whatever nasty junk those dumb plant-freaks were throwin’ at her, Texas is here to punch it out of the city to the other side of the wasteland!”

Julie shifts and makes a wavery little noise and Texas swallows, stroking her shoulder carefully. “No, seriously,” he tells her quietly, “you don't have to be scared of _nothin’_ while Texas is lookin’ after you, okay?”

Mike isn't sure she's awake enough to understand the words, but she does seem to settle some, possibly because of the quiet tone. He gives Texas a grateful half-smile for being comforting and optimistic and _Texas_ , and goes back to working on that knot.

Dutch is back a minute later, and he's got a hairbrush and two combs, which he brandishes with determination. “Alright, knowin’ the right tools is half the job. And, uh, I don't know which of these is gonna work best, but I figure just try them out, see how it goes.”

“Uh-huh,” Chuck says, mouth pulled dubiously to one side. “And who exactly were you planning to volunteer to try them out?”

Dutch blinks. “I mean… you guys all have straight hair. You probably know how to—”

“Dude, no,” Chuck says. “None of us have, like, a  _meter_  of straight hair, okay, it is _not_ the same thing. Mike doesn't even let his grow past his ears.”

“Uh-huh, yeah,” says Texas, “and you can just mark Texas off the list right now. Texas is on protection duty. Can't start messin’ around with girly sleepover hair-combing junk, gotta stay alert.”

Dutch rolls his eyes, but Mike grins and reaches over to steal Texas’s hat so he can ruffle his hair thoroughly. “Good job, Tex. You keep Jules safe, we'll take care of her hair.”

Texas can't entirely hide the smile, but he huffs and pretends to glare at Mike. “Hey, Tiny, not cool with the hat theft. Come on, give it back.”

Part of Mike wants to hunch apologetically and cooperate, make sure Texas can't be mad, but—Texas _isn't_ and Mike _knows_ that, and if he starts being dumb and scared of nothing again he'll make the others sad and not do Julie any good either. So instead he eyes Texas thoughtfully, nibbling on one corner of his lip, still grinning.

“Hmm, I dunno, dude. It looked pretty good on Chuck, y’know? Maybe it'd look okay on me, too. I think we oughta test it out,” he says, pretending confidence he doesn't feel, and pulls the hat on.

His heart is going a little faster than it should be, but Texas just kinda stares a minute, eyes wide and mouth open, and then rolls his eyes and looks away.

“Yeah, fine, I guess you can wear Texas’s hat for a while,” he grumbles. His cheeks look kind of flushed. Maybe it's the extra body heat from having Julie kind of curled up against him.

Dutch is snickering. Chuck makes a judging kind of _hmm_ noise, but Mike can't tell who it's aimed at.

“Okay but _anyway_ ,” Chuck says pointedly, “so what, Mike, are you volunteering to take care of this mess?” He waves at Julie’s hair and Dutch swats him.

“Hey, don't call it a mess, man! She's got gorgeous hair, it just needs a little work right now.”

“How about,” Mike says before the two of them can start bickering, “all three of us try? I mean, there's three things to comb with, we can each pick one and just work together.”

Dutch and Chuck look at each other. Dutch nods and Chuck shrugs and sighs. “Sure, why not. She's got way too much hair for us to pull it _all_ out.”

“Man, you keep talkin’ like that, I'm not gonna give you a comb at all,” Dutch says.

It takes a minute to arrange themselves. Mike just stays where he is, since Julie’s hair is right there, and Dutch and Chuck end up sitting on the floor side by side in front of him and Julie. No one is paying attention to the movie, which Chuck set to a pretty low volume anyway, maybe to make it easier for Julie to nap like she is.

“Bet I can untangle this strand all the way to the top before you finish yours,” Chuck says to Dutch, starting at the bottom of one section of long red hair.

“Oh, you think, huh?” Dutch says. “You think you're better with your hands than me?”

“I dunno,” Chuck answers, blasé, “my finger dexterity is pretty good. As I think you remember.”

Mike swallows, trying to focus on the bit of hair he's brushing. (He was gonna try to go a lot faster but the other two are taking much smaller bunches of hair and starting from the bottom, so he's following their lead and it seems to work better.) There's nothing wrong with what they're saying, it's more the _way_ they're saying it that kinda sounds like… maybe they're talking about something else. Something, uh… intimate. Or that could just be Mike imagining things because Chuck is kneeling in front of him and it's kind of doing things to his brain.

“What do you think, Mike?” Dutch says, grinning up at him, and Mike almost drops his brush.

“Uh. Think of what?” he says, flushing hot all over.

“Finger dexterity,” Dutch says, unperturbed by Chuck elbowing him and growling. “You think me or Chuck is better with our hands?”

Mike swallows again, eyes flickering between them, and suddenly remembers lying across their laps with their hands on him, rubbing the tension out of his muscles, making him feel so good—he wrenches his eyes away, face burning. “Dunno,” he says, and quickly tries to cover. “I mean, Dutch, you're pretty good with, like, dealing with little pieces, putting parts together, but Chuck’s good with wiring and delicate stuff like that, so. I mean, both of you are really good, you know?”

“Aw,” Dutch says, and his grin has softened, lost the wicked edge as he looks at Mike. “Listen to you bein’ all fair and sweet.”

“Yeah,” Chuck says, “he's good at that.” He aims a crooked smile at Mike, then snorts suddenly. “Unlike brushing hair, apparently. I guess we know who's losing the dexterity contest.”

Mike blinks at where he is on the strand of hair he's working on, and then where Chuck and Dutch are. Dutch is a little farther ahead than Chuck, but both of them have made a lot more progress than Mike.

He huffs at them. “Come on, guys—I'm the one with the brush, remember? That's obviously harder.”

Dutch immediately shoves his comb at Mike, grinning. Giving him a narrow-eyed look, Mike takes it in exchange for the brush.

A few minutes later he groans in disgust, trying to pull the comb out of a knot that seems to be trying to eat it. “Oh my god, you both suck.”

Dutch opens his mouth and goes _“Uhf_ ,” as Chuck elbows him viciously.

“Not our fault you're no good at delicate manipulations, bro,” Chuck says primly.

“He's right, though,” Dutch says to Chuck, barely holding back a grin. “We do suck.”

Chuck swats at him as Mike’s fingers fumble on the comb. Okay, that's—that's not just him. They're definitely saying this stuff on purpose. And not just to flirt with each other, which would at least make sense, but they keep kind of bringing him into it too? Unless he's just imagining that.

Glaring at the comb-eating knot, he grimly starts tugging at one edge of the tangle, holding the hair above tightly so he won't hurt Julie.

“If you need help with that, bro, you can always ask,” Chuck says, and maybe he means it, but he's also being a smug jerk.

“Maybe we should give you some finger exercises,” Dutch muses, and Chuck elbows him again, going pink, and Mike doesn't really get how that's an innuendo, but Chuck thinks it is, so Dutch probably meant it that way, and you know what? Fine.

Mike looks over to meet Dutch’s eyes squarely, gives him a slow smile. “I mean, sure, you could do that.” He turns the smile on Chuck, who sort of freezes. “But you guys know me, I'm better at full-body movement. Anything that gets you hot and sweaty, gets your blood pumping and your heart rate up, I'm probably gonna be pretty good at it.”

He can say it because it's true; his physical coordination has always been exceptional. Back in the Cadet Corps, his scores were pretty much unmatched on stuff like obstacle courses, dodging, jumping, climbing, fighting.

But from the way Dutch and Chuck react, they're thinking about completely different activities. Activities neither of them have to know Mike doesn’t have all that much experience with. Or like, any. Dutch’s eyes are round. Chuck is making a little squeaky noise, then abruptly ducks his head, trying to hide his face behind his bangs. The tips of his ears are turning red. Mike smirks victoriously, then turns back to fighting with that knot.

“Oh, _hey_ ,” Texas says slowly, and Mike looks up at him. He's staring from Mike to Chuck and Dutch and back, and his expression is shocked and kind of—upset? Cheeks flushed, brow furrowed, he looks at the three of them like—like he's hurt, somehow, which sucks, Mike didn't mean to put that look on his face. It makes Mike’s chest tight, even though he doesn't know what he did, what made Texas unhappy.

“Hey, you can't—you—you can't do that,” Texas says, frowning at them.

Mike isn't sure what he means. Dutch and Chuck wince like they get it, though. Maybe all the flirting made him uncomfortable?

Dutch is opening his mouth when Texas lifts a careful hand to cover the side of Julie’s head that's not pressed against his chest. “You can't be makin’ sex jokes around girls, that's not nice,” he says, glaring at Dutch, and then at Chuck, and then shooting a quick, uncertain glance at Mike. “‘Specially when, like, she's all…” He glances down at Julie, and over at Mike again, and then looks almost defiantly at Dutch and Chuck. “All messed up still.”

Oh. Maybe Mike gets it after all. Julie isn't the only one who's messed up after today, it's been kind of rough all around, and Texas… isn't really the best at… he doesn't always know how to handle his feelings. Chuck and Dutch are dealing with the whole mess by really leaning in to each other, and Mike is—fine, he's handling things, he's okay. But Texas is sitting there with Julie clinging to him in her sleep, and Mike knows how much he likes Julie and now she's all messed up, and then Dutch and Chuck and Mike are, like, making weird jokes and stuff—yeah. Mike thinks he gets it. To Texas, that could all sound like they don't care, like they've already forgotten all the horrible stuff somehow.

“Sorry, man,” Dutch says, grimacing a little as he shares a look with Chuck. “We'll cut it out, all right?”

Texas just kind of stares at him a second, confused misery still hiding under his glower, before looking away, rolling his head to one side and the other to stretch his neck.

“Yeah. ‘Kay,” he mutters.

For a few minutes everyone's quiet and kind of awkward as the hair-combing resumes. Mike tries to think of something to say to distract them all, get the conversation on to something safe, but his mind keeps going blank. Or getting stuck on, like, why Chuck and Dutch would be joking by flirting with him in the first place, which seems kind of mean now that he's thinking about it. Although obviously they don't actually know he's so awkwardly, jealously _into_ them, and maybe if he wasn't he'd just think it was a funny joke. That makes sense, that's probably it.

Julie jerks and moans in her sleep, and Texas cautiously pats her shoulder. It doesn't seem to help, because she keeps twitching and making little noises as he pats her anxiously until she actually jerks awake with a sharp scream, sitting bolt upright between him and Mike and scrabbling to push away, get on her feet.

“Whoa, Jules, hey,” Mike says, pulling his comb hastily out of her hair as Chuck mutters _“Aw crap,”_ and scoots backwards on the floor, giving her space.

“ _Julie_ ,” Texas says, one hand on her arm, “you're totally safe now, for real! All those dumb Nega-whoevers are totally busted up and can't get you no more, you're with the Burners, you're safe!”

“Burners,” Julie mutters, looking around wildly. Mike can't tell if she's really seeing their faces or not.

He leans forward. “Jules, you're free. You're awake, you just woke up, and this is real. You made it home, you're okay.”

She's still breathing hard, but she stops trying to pull away and stand. Panting, she keeps looking around, and this time it looks like she might be taking in what's in front of her.

“Home,” she says, uncertain, like she wants to believe it but isn't sure she should.

Mike takes a deep breath and tries not to imagine where she's been in her dreams, what she's been dealing with while having that many burrs on her. Can't think about it; she's awake now, she needs reassurance and grounding and not for Mike to get lost remembering what it was like to not know the difference between dreams and reality.

“Yeah, home,” Texas says, encouragingly, patting her shoulder again. She turns to look at him and he says, “Home with all of us, Mike and Texas and Dutch and Chuck. We gotcha, it's cool now, nobody’s gonna mess with you here. You're safe. Promise.”

Her shoulders sink, losing some of the tension holding her rigid, and she lets out a long, shivering sigh. This time when she looks around at them, she's staring intently, studying their faces one at a time. Mike gives her a little smile when she gets to him, and although she doesn't smile back she seems to relax another notch. Her eyes get caught on his neck, blinking from it to his face, and Mike abruptly remembers the silvery lines of Dutch’s art on him and that she wasn't here to see it before. She shakes it off, though, and spends a moment looking from Mike to Texas and back again with a puzzled squint before grabbing the hat Mike’s wearing, pulling it off and putting it on Texas’s head, then inspecting Mike again before looking satisfied. Mike sheepishly smooths his bangs back down. Texas looks caught between triumph and similar sheepishness as he adjusts his hat.

“Boys,” Julie murmurs, studying Texas again. “Got back to my boys, I—I made it.”

Mike bites his lip. _Her boys_. Yeah, they are.

“Aw, geez,” Dutch says quietly, half-smiling, and Mike knows exactly what he means. The tangle of warmth and protectiveness in Mike’s chest right now is so fierce it aches.

“Yeah, you did good,” Texas tells her, “you were totally badass! And now you get to, like, chill and get better and stuff, and we're gonna take care of you. Okay?”

“Yeah,” Julie mumbles, and sort of falls over on him, snuggling closer until she's basically in his lap. “Safe,” she sighs. “Got my boys.” She rubs her cheek against his jaw, makes another little contented noise and goes still, breath slowing and quieting.

Everyone holds very still for a few minutes, not wanting to disturb her. Mike glances cautiously around and is relieved to find that Dutch and Chuck look just as helplessly charmed and kind of heart-melty as Mike feels. Texas has his hands settled very gently on her shoulders, under her hair, and a soft, kind of amazed look on his face as he watches her. Mike bets Texas would do just about anything right now to protect this tough, brave little bundle of girl-limbs and tangled hair. Mike’s pretty sure they all would.

“Okay,” Dutch says very quietly. “We ready to get rid of the rest of those knots?”

“Yeah,” Chuck says, just as quiet.

“You got it,” Mike murmurs back, and scoots over next to Texas, since Julie’s in his lap now.

Chuck and Dutch have mostly stopped competing and flirting, just the occasional sly glance passing between them now. Mike is still annoyingly bad at fighting through knots with the comb, and finally goes back to the brush at Dutch’s suggestion. Between the three of them, they finally get Julie’s hair more or less into its usual smooth red sweep.

Dutch puts the combs and brush back where he got them while Chuck cues up another movie. He and Dutch sit back down on the couch, not together but bookending Mike and Texas, to Mike’s surprise. Dutch strokes Julie’s hair gently and Chuck puts an arm over Mike’s shoulders, and Mike isn't sure why they've decided to stop being all over each other for the moment, but he's okay with this, this kind of group togetherness. It feels _good_ , like the last movie marathon did. Warm and caring and safe.

It's kind of hard not to lean into Chuck, and eventually he just gives in and puts his arm around the guy too, settles back against the couch and watches the people on-screen put together a heist. Chuck’s turned the volume up just enough to hear easily, not that it really matters with the number of times Mike, at least, has seen this movie.

When it's over he's warm and a little dozy, but hungry enough to counteract the comfortable stupor. After some discussion he and Dutch volunteer to scrounge up dinner and head for the kitchen.

“Last loaf of rosemary bread’s thawed,” Dutch reports as Mike pokes through the fridge. “We could do sandwiches.”

“Yes!” Mike says in relief. “Yeah, sounds good.”

Dutch laughs as Mike starts pulling out potential sandwich fillings. “You're not eager to finish up the kale ginger salad? Or the squash and garlic jello?”

“You know, I think I'll let Texas take care of those,” Mike says, turning from the fridge with an armful of containers, and Dutch hurries to help. They get everything laid out on the counter and Mike starts slicing the bread while Dutch assembles sandwiches. They're standing side by side, and Mike doesn't really notice how close they are until he helps with the last few sandwiches and he and Dutch are both kind of reaching past each other a lot, right up in each other's space.

It's not a problem, obviously, just, a thing. Kind of a really nice thing, that Mike maybe guiltily enjoys a little more than he should.

He's almost finished with the final sandwich when Dutch says, “Hey,” quietly, and Mike glances up just as Dutch lifts a hand to his face, long fingers cool against his cheek. Mike’s kind of frozen, staring up at Dutch with his heart pounding, wondering crazily if somehow Dutch figured out how much Mike was enjoying this, and Dutch just leans down and kisses him, like it’s easy. Everything goes very still for a moment while Dutch’s lips are on his, soft and warm and moving and Mike tries to do—something, kiss back, but he's not really sure how and everything's spinning a little and maybe he shouldn't have stopped breathing—

Dutch pulls away. Mike stares at him with round eyes and sucks in a deep breath.

“Oh,” he says stupidly. “Oh _wow_ , dude,” and he breaks into a grin, and Dutch is grinning back, kind of shy and thrilled and with his eyes all warm on Mike's.

“I know, um,” Dutch says, “this ain't exactly the best time, I just, uh…” He shrugs, and Mike nods a lot. Dutch just kissed him, though, that actually happened. Dutch likes him too, likes him enough to kiss, thinks he’s something like as good as Chuck— brilliant, brave, funny, resilient Chuck— and Tennie too, _wow_.

“Right, yeah,” Mike blurts out, gracelessly, “I— me too? But. Yeah. Bad— um, bad time, for it, but. You’re—” he leans up to press a kiss of his own to Dutch’s mouth, trying to make that point. He likes Dutch, a _lot_ , this is awesome. The way Dutch grins at him before going back to making sandwiches, he thinks it’s just as great, and that’s awesome too, and everything’s just— okay, it’s a mess, but great too, it’s confusing. But it’s the kind of confusing where Mike gets kissed, and man! He’s okay with that.

The minute they get back to the others Chuck takes one look at Mike’s face and just _knows_ somehow.

“ _DUTCH_ , YOU DIDN’T!” he squawks, swiping his bangs back to level a full-frontal glare on the poor guy, and they both jump at once, Dutch startled, Mike suddenly panicked and guilty.

“I,” Mike starts, and doesn’t know what else to say, shrinking back on automatic. Weeks of dealing with Chuck’s anger rises up and chokes him. “I, I, uh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know he— shouldn’t have, I shouldn’t have, I didn’t mean to— um—”

“No, not— jeez, Mike, not you, sorry, don’t— look at me like that, c’mere,” Chuck says, immediately flustering. He waves his hands awkwardly and almost knocks Texas’s hat off, trying to usher Mike back into a seat, and it’s too late to run without looking really crazy, which Mike doesn’t have an excuse for anymore, so. He sits down, horribly aware of the warmth and size and solidity of Chuck on one side and Texas on the other, and how he’s just holding a plate of sandwiches even though his stomach’s cramped up in a hard knot now and he doesn’t want to eat anything.

“Hey,” Chuck says, hoarsely, and puts his arm, very carefully, back around Mike’s shoulders. “You okay? I shouldn’t have yelled, sorry.”

“Yeah, no more yelling,” Texas says sternly. “This is a no jerks zone, Skinny, get with the program.”

They all look at Julie, but she’s somehow still asleep. Everyone breathes a very careful sigh of relief.

“I’m still sorry,” Mike says carefully. “I don’t want to… get in the way. Of anything.”

“You wouldn’t be,” Dutch says, leaning over the back of the couch. “ _Would he, Chuck_?”

Mike dares a look at Chuck’s face, only to see him starting to go pink. He makes a series of increasingly high, hoarse noises, before bursting out with, “ _No! I mean, yes, I— no, wait, I mean yeah no you wouldn’t be!”_

Dutch snickers. Texas frowns.

Mike licks his lips, uncertain, and Chuck makes a little choked squeaky noise and jerks his head to look away, and Mike's eyes widen.

“Just because Dutch got there _first_ ,” Chuck mumbles, “doesn't mean, um…” He doesn't seem to find a way to finish, but that's okay, Mike already feels like his heart just exploded, but in a good way.

“Really?” he says cautiously. He's not sure if Chuck means ‘got to Mike first’ or ‘got to Chuck first’, but either way it'd mean the same thing. If Chuck is serious and meant to say that, it would.

“I— yeah, _really_ ,” Chuck says, and leans in to kind of… press his forehead against Mike’s, for a ticklish second, his hair going everywhere, then leans back and looks away. He’s blushing all the way down his throat, now, it’s… really cute. Mike can finally admit that, it’s okay. Chuck is really cute and Mike can look at his throat, and smile, and think about— when it’s not such a bad time— when they get more of a chance, when Julie’s okay, and Texas isn’t so worried, then…

Mike could kiss Chuck.

“Wow,” Mike says softly. Dutch laughs, and ruffles his hair, and goes to start passing out sandwiches. Chuck sneaks a look at Mike and smiles a little, even though he still looks mortified. Texas snorts, apparently giving up on figuring out what they’re all up to, and starts the movie.

The sandwiches are pretty good, actually, but what’s better is the way his friends draw in all around him, pushing him into the middle again with Julie, determinedly protective. Yeah, Dutch kissed him, and Chuck doesn’t mind, and maybe there’s gonna be more kisses in the future, but they’re all still… his friends, his team, his Burners. They’re all here, and okay. That’s the best.

When he wakes up it's got to be a couple hours later at least, because a different movie's on and Texas is asleep, slumped against the back of the sofa—

And Julie is awake, eyes glittering in the light from the movie screen. She's still curled up against Texas, but her hands are clasped firmly around Mike’s arm and her gaze is fixed on his face. From her expression it's hard to tell if she's okay, all the way awake, or still confused by her dreams.

“Hey, Jules,” Mike says softly, straightening up a little—oh, he was sleeping kind of leaned over on Chuck. And Chuck let him. That's… really nice.

“Don't worry,” Julie says, and her low voice rasps with exhaustion, but her gaze never wavers. “They won't get past me, I'm watching.”

Mike swallows, doesn't ask who _they_ are. “You're doing great,” he says instead, putting a hand carefully on her shoulder and squeezing gently. “But I'm awake now, okay? You can go back to sleep, I'll keep watch. It's safe.”

She eyes him a moment, frowning, and he does his best to look watchful and awake. Geez, he's tired, what time is it?

“You have to be careful,” she says, giving him a fierce look. “When you think you're safe, they're right there, and they're not _allowed_. You're mine, they don't get to take you away again.” She blinks, too-slow and sleepy, looks dazed for a moment before she squints at him. “I won't let them, I'll keep you safe.”

Mike’s heart does something sharp and painful as he stares at her. She's so small, and brave, and strong, and obviously thinking he's still the one in trouble, so she's trying to protect him, even hurting and confused and completely worn out like she is. God, she's amazing.

He wants to kiss her, too.

Which is a terrible idea, because she's not even really awake and who knows if she wants him and—like Dutch said, this is a really bad time, even just for doing things with, like, guys who are all on the same page about stuff. Like, the worst possible time to think about kissing Julie _too_. It's just, Mike’s dealing with all these feelings about how impressive and great she is and how much he likes her and wants her to have everything good, and it kind of all adds up into _really_ wanting to kiss her. _A lot_.

He shoves that firmly away, smiles at her instead. “I know you will, but hey, everyone else can help, right? We can all keep each other safe. So you can go ahead and nap, because me and Dutch and Chuck are keeping watch. Okay?”

Julie gives him a narrow-eyed look and then looks past him at Chuck. “You have to keep him safe.”

Mike glances sideways at Chuck, but instead of arguing like Mike is half-afraid he's going to, Chuck nods, lips in a firm line. “We will. Promise.”

Julie stares at him a moment, but she must see something in his face because she nods, satisfied, and settles back against Texas, her grip loosening on Mike’s arm. Her eyes close, and her breathing slows in seconds.

Mike lets out a long breath and quirks Chuck a tired smile. “Thanks,” he murmurs.

Chuck hesitates, nibbling on his lip, before looking back at the movie and dropping an arm over Mike’s shoulders. “I was serious, actually,” he says, keeping his voice just as low. “You're safe now, you and Julie both, and we're going to keep you that way. Now go back to sleep, Mikey, it's the middle of the friggin’ night.”

“What about you, though, you gotta—”

“Dutch and I are trading watches,” Chuck says firmly. “One of us needs to be awake for the next time Julie wakes up. And not you, bro,” he adds as Mike opens his mouth. “You're still recovering. Get some rest.”

“But you guys need to—”

“Man,” Dutch says sleepily on the other side of Texas, “we can handle this, all right? Let us take care of you for once.”

Mike looks from Chuck’s face to Dutch’s in the flickering light from the movie. Dutch smiles a little and raises his eyebrows pointedly, and Mike gives in.

“Okay,” he says, leaning into Chuck again. “Just make sure you guys get _some_ rest, okay? Not like you've been getting a lot of sleep lately.” He _must_ be tired, he's pretty sure he didn't mean to say that last part out loud.

Chuck makes a choking noise and Dutch snorts with laughter, stifling himself quickly.

“Oh my god,” Chuck says, and even in the blueish light Mike can tell his cheeks are flushed. “Both of you shut up and go to sleep!” he hisses.

Dutch lowers his voice and murmurs something back, but Mike’s busy snuggling down and isn't listening. He falls asleep still smiling.


End file.
